


Rescue Me

by Marblez



Category: Twilight Series - All Media Types, Twilight Series - Stephenie Meyer
Genre: Alternate Universe, Child Abuse, F/M, Swearing
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-08-23
Updated: 2014-08-23
Packaged: 2018-02-14 09:59:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 25
Words: 36,107
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2187495
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Marblez/pseuds/Marblez
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>ALL HUMAN. HET! Jasper Whitlock doesn't have a happy home life. It's as simple as that. He doesn't know if he wants to be rescued...but Alice Cullen is determined to rescue him anyway...</p><p>(originally posted on fanfiction.net)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I don't own Twilight or the characters in it. They belong entirely to Stephanie. I'm just borrowing them for a little while.

A/N All human in this story.

Warning: Child Abuse.

Rescue Me

 

Chapter One

Sneaking out of his window was not an easy task, it required climbing down a most difficult tree. He only did it when he desperately needed too and right now he desperately needed to see a doctor about his hand. Now climbing down the tree with two good hands was difficult enough, climbing down it with one good hand and one hand that had just had the door slammed on it repeatedly was almost impossible. In the end he dropped the last few feet and added a twisted ankle to his long list of injuries. Briefly looking back at the house to make sure that his father hadn't heard his escape he started walking down the road, staying as close to the edge as possible. It was night time after all, he was dressed in dark clothes and there were no street lights for a mile…not a good combination. He limped along, holding his wounded hand close to his stomach with the other. Cars passed in both directions, their headlamps briefly lighting up the way for him but none of them stopped for him.

Eventually he reached the streetlights and with them came a pavement. That was safer at least. But now it was getting colder and his entire body was wracked with shivers. It took him almost two hours to walk from the dump where he lived on the outskirts of Forks to the hospital right in the centre of town. Usually he could make it in an hour but with his newly hurt ankle and the dark it had taken quite a bit longer.

He entered the emergency room, wincing at the sudden brightness of the lights. Limping over the reception desk he dropped himself into one of the chairs in front of it. The woman who took his details kept looked worriedly at his bruised eye, his bruised cheekbone and his split lip. He knew she already had him pegged. Abused kid. He hated her pity just like he hated everyone else's. Pity had never helped anyone and it certainly didn't help him. He gave her his name, his age, his date of birth, his social, his address and only after all that did she ask what was 'the problem'.

"I had an accident earlier, got my hand slammed in the door. My fault but I think it might be broken." That had been his story and that was what he was sticking too no matter what they all thought by the end of this. She filled all this in on the computer and told him to take a seat in the waiting room and one of the doctors would be with him shortly. Shortly turned out to be twenty minutes.

"Jasper Whitlock?" the young woman in the Nurses uniform asked, reading from the clipboard in her hand. He got up from the uncomfortable seat and followed her into the examination room, still limping. In fact the limp was worse now, the ankle burned with pain the pain of every step.

"Hello Jasper, I'm Dr Cullen," the blond doctor who was waiting for him said kindly as he took the clipboard from the nurse and checked the information on it, "Now you say that your hand got slammed in the door. Well have a seat on the bed there and we'll have a look at it." He turned away as Jasper awkwardly got onto the ridiculously high bed, Dr Cullen pulling on some white gloves. When he turned back he held his hands out expectantly and Jasper put his painful right hand into his gentle ones, wincing as the doctor pressed gently in different places. "How many times did the door shut on your hand Jasper?"

"J-Just the once," Jasper stuttered.

"Hmmm," Dr Cullen hummed thoughtfully, "We'd best get this x-rayed. It looks like your broken quite a few of the bones in your hand, maybe even a couple of your fingers. Michaela, could you have Jasper taken down to the x-ray room and get a couple of x-rays of his hands taken. I need to sort out some paperwork." It was a lie and all three of them knew it, Dr Cullen was going to look into Jasper's background for any signs of past abuse and he'd find all the secret trips to the ER.

"Charlie. Hi it's Dr Cullen, Edwards dad. Yeah, well this isn't actually a social call. No I'm afraid it's business. I've just seen a kid whose hands been slammed by a door. He says it was only the once but there are multiple breaks in the bones. I thought it was suspicious so I looked into his medical history and I found numerous visits to the ER for different injuries. A broken wrist last year. Three cracked ribs earlier this year. A nasty concussion two months ago. Yeah, I wondered if you could come in and talk to the kid. Thanks. His names Jasper Whitlock. Yeah, I wont let him know you're coming, I have a feeling he'd run if he knew I'd called the police. See you in a few minutes."

"Can I go home now?" Jasper asked once Dr Cullen had finished putting the cast on his recently set hand. His first and middle finger were also strapped together tightly, both broken. He had been given pain medication early on and now he held a bag of prescription painkillers in his good hand.

"No I'm afraid not Jasper," an unfamiliar voice said and Jasper turned it looked at the tall man walking into the examination room, pushing the curtain out of the way. And he was dressed like a cop.

"Shit."

A/N There we go, first chapter. What do you think?

A/N 2 I'm completely amazed, I'm writing a HET story. Wow!


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer: I don't own Twilight or the characters in it. They belong entirely to Stephanie. I'm just borrowing them for a little while.

A/N All human in this story.

Warning: Child Abuse.

Rescue Me

Chapter Two.

In all his years as the Chief of Police he hadn't yet had to deal with a case of child abuse. It just didn't happen in Forks. Sure families had fights and screaming matches, what teenager didn't enjoy screaming at their parents? Even he and Bella fought occasionally and they were both as mild tempered as could be. But the thick folder in his hands couldn't be anything but a case of child abuse, after all Dr Cullen had only named a few examples of the boys past injuries. He'd read through the file while the boy's hand was treated, starting with the first entry when the boy was seven and living in Houston, Texas. A broken arm. Thirty minutes later and he felt sick to his stomach as he'd closed the thick file and followed Dr Cullen to the treatment room where the boy was being seen to.

"I'm Chief Swan," Charlie said softly to the boy who was doing a very good impression of a deer caught in the headlights. "I think we need to have a talk Jasper."

"What about?" the boy asked, trying to sound braver than he looked. He looked…vulnerable. His messy blond hair was sticking out every which way, flopping into his eyes so that he kept brushing it out of the way with his good hand. Charlie noticed a thick scar on the back of that unbroken hand. And his eyes, the blue orbs held so much pain and fear that Charlie didn't want to keep eye contact with him but at the same time they had him mesmerised so that he couldn't look away.

"Jasper, if someone at home is abusing you-"

"No one's abusing me," Jasper interrupted quickly, shaking his head from side to side, "I'm just clumsy, that's all."

"Jasper my daughter is clumsy, seriously clumsy and the worst thing she's ever done is fallen down some stairs and through a window. She broke her leg," Charlie said gently, "How many times do you think it says you've 'fallen down the stairs' in your file? How many times do you think it says you've broken your arm? Or your leg?" Charlie asked, his voice just as soft as he held the thick file up for the now trembling boy to see.

"I…" Jasper mumbled.

"You can talk to us Jasper. We just want to help you," Dr Cullen said in his kindest voice, his hand reaching out as if he wanted to touch Jaspers shoulder gently. The boy flinched away quickly and the doctor sighed sadly, his hand returning to his side, "But Jasper, we can't help you if you don't talk to us."

"I don't…I don't want or need your help," Jasper said quickly, his voice shaking, "Can I go home now?" Both Doctor and Policeman sighed sadly before nodding, they unfortunately couldn't force the boy to report this. They could however keep an eye on him and make it clear that their help was always there for him,

"Jasper, if you ever do need to talk…" Dr Cullen said quickly before the boy could leave, pulling one of his small business cards out of his white hospital coats pocket, "You can reach me on the top of these numbers at any time. The bottom is my number here at the hospital. We just want to help Jasper."

"Yeah, whatever," the boy muttered as he took the card.

And then he was gone.

He practically ran all the way home, desperately hoping is dad was too drunk to notice he was gone…or notice the cast. Jasper had already pulled his jackets sleeve down as far as it would go, hiding most of the bulky cast. But nothing could be done to hide the bit of the cast on his fingers; his old jacket wasn't long enough. Turning into his road he cursed his luck. The downstairs lights were on. When he'd left his dad had been getting drunker and drunker in his bedroom. Upstairs. If he was downstairs now that meant he knew that Jasper was gone.

"Crap," Jasper muttered, walking up the few steps to the front door. There was no point in sneaking in now. He turned the handle, not surprised it was unlocked and stepped into the brightly lit hall.

"Where the fuck have you been?" His dad was sat on the third step of the stairs, leaning against the banister. He had a beer in his hand and three empties at his feet told Jasper that he'd been waiting a while for Jasper to get home. He was dead.

"I…" Jasper mumbled, reaching up with both hands to push his hair back.

"What the fuck is that?" his dad demanded, pointing to the broken hand. Jasper winced and bit his lip, he'd forgotten. How could have forgotten? "You little fucker!" His dad flew towards Jasper, his hand closing around Jasper's throat as he slammed his sons back against wall. Jasper cried out in pain. "You went to the hospital didn't you? Didn't you?"

"I-I had too!" Jasper choked out, his good hand scratching at his dad's fingers as his breathing was restricted. "There were…nine breaks…"

"What did you tell them?"

"I-I told them…I'd had…an accident." He gasped loudly when hid dad released him suddenly, his own hand going to his throat to hold the bruising skin gently. "I told them I accidentally got my hand caught in the door."

"No one suspected?"

He wanted to scream 'yes' in his dads face, to laugh and tell him that someone cared about him and that he would be getting away…

"No," he mumbled instead, his voice as subdued as his spirits, "No one suspected." His dad nodded once and then stumbled away towards the kitchen, in need of another beer no doubt. That left Jasper alone to stumble up the stairs to bed.

A/N There we go, another chapter. Thanks for the response to the first chapter. Hope you enjoyed this one.


	3. Chapter 3

Disclaimer: I don't own Twilight or the characters in it. They belong entirely to Stephanie. I'm just borrowing them for a little while.

A/N All human in this story.

Warning: Child Abuse.

Rescue Me

Chapter Three.

"Morning all!" Alice sang cheerfully as she danced into the kitchen. A picture of wide-awake happiness. She got a nod from Edward and a grunt from Emmett, her adopted brothers. They'd been up till two in the morning writing last minute essays that they had conveniently forgotten to do. Rosalie, her adopted sister waved a good morning to her while blowing on the just painted nails of her other hand. "It's going to be a good day, I can feel it."

"Uh-huh," Emmett grumbled, "A history essay due in first thing, a biology test later and outdoor games. Look at the rain! It's pouring down!"

"You are such a negative person," Alice shook her head at him as she slipped into her usual seat, taking a sip of her orange juice. Esme, their wonderful foster mother put a plate of fresh toast, covered with strawberry jam before her, "Oh thank you Esme! My favourite, perfect start to the day."

"Your welcome dear," Esme said, leaning down to kiss the top of her head. Esme was a wonderful woman, a bit young to have four teenage children. But she and Carlisle, her husband, had tried countless times to have their own children and when the traditional methods failed they tried all the medical ones they could afford. Nothing had worked and Esme's heart had broken a little more each time. So in the end they decided that if they couldn't have children of their own they would adopt, take in some poor children that needed loving parents. Going to the children's home where they used to live had been horrible; Esme had wanted to take them all home with her, not just one. The woman in charge had obviously expected them to choose a baby or a toddler like most young coupes did. Instead they chose Edward, a shy little eleven-year-old boy who loved music. Six months later they had gone back and adopted a little girl, Esme wanted one of each. They'd chosen a little girl who was going to grow up to be a beautiful woman called Rosalie. She was a year older than Edward. The family moved a year later and Esme got that urge to adopt again, wanting to extend their family. This time they adopted Emmett, a strong boy from a troubled background who was the same age as Rosalie. Within days he had been head over heels in love with his 'sister'. And then a year after Emmett had joined the family Alice had been brought into Carlisle's emergency room with severe traumatic amnesia. She couldn't remember anything but her name, Mary Alice Brandon. She'd always preferred Alice. Her parents had never been found and the loving couple had adopted her too.

"I'm picking Bella up on the way so one of you three will have to drive the rest of you to school," Edward said quietly.

"No surprise there," Emmett muttered.

"I'll drive," Rosalie said calmly, "My cars the most practical in this weather. Emmett, can you put the top up for me?" Emmett would do anything for his girlfriend and got up from the breakfast table, kissing her lips once before going into the garage to put the top up on Rosalie's convertible.

"Why can't we take my car?" Alice asked, "We never take my car."

"Because your car only takes two people," Rosalie pointed out, "And there's three of us. I doubt Edward wants one of us there cramping his style when he picks Bella up." Alice nodded in acceptance but one day she was determined she would take her yellow 911 Turbo Porsche to school and turn heads. Not that they didn't turn heads in Rosalie's red convertible or Emmett's monster of a jeep. Only Edwards car was semi-normal, a sleek silver Volvo. And yes the Cullen children really did have an expensive car each, given to them as presents on their sixteenth birthdays. Alice's of course had been a guess as she couldn't remember and they had never found any of her records. It was lucky that Carlisle's job at the hospital paid so well and also that Esme, a professional Interior Designer was so sought after or they'd never have been able to afford the cars, their house and their lifestyle.

"I'm gonna be off, see you all at school," Edward said as he rose from the breakfast table, taking his cereal bowl over to the sink before he grabbed his heavy school bag and entered the garage. Minutes later they heard one of the automatic doors open slowly, Edwards engine roar into life and then the sound of him driving rather recklessly out of their garage.

As Alice ate her toast Rosalie disappeared upstairs to put her nail varnish away and check her appearance one last time. Rosalie was literally the most gorgeous girl in school and even though she knew this she wasn't as big headed about it as she could have been. Oh she was still big headed about her looks but she definitely could have been worse. Alice on the other hand couldn't care less, her hair was messy as every and her clothes didn't really match. Lot's of kids at Forks High called her weird and her nickname was 'the hippy pixie' in honour of her style and her height. She'd stopped growing not long after being adopted by the Cullens and was the smallest person in her year, hell she was smaller than the youngest person in Forks High.

"Where's my girl?" Emmett asked when he came in for his bag.

"Mirror check," Alice said, pointing to the ceiling. Emmett went to the bottom of the stairs and before anyone could tell him not to shouted very loudly,

"Babe! We gotta go!"

"Next time Emmett, go up and tell her please," Esme said as she cleared Rosalie and Emmett's breakfast things from the table. Alice scoffed the last piece of toast down and was washing it down with the last bit of her orange juice when Rosalie walked calmly down the stairs in her amazing high heels. Rosalie never wore flats except for in games and then it was designer trainers.

"Let's go midget," Emmett said, pulling Alice up from her chair. "We can't be late today. It's bad enough already."

"We won't be late," Alice scoffed at him but picked up her bag and followed them obediently into the garage, kissing Esme on the cheek on her way. Rosalie slipped into the drivers seat of the red Mercedes convertible, now with it's top up and Emmett climbed into the front passenger leaving Alice to climb in the back. Using the clicker thing on her key ring Rosalie opened the garage doors and then pulled out into the torrential down poor.

"It's really heavy today, drive careful babe," Emmett said, his hand reaching over to brush Rosalie's blond hair away from her face in a loving gesture.

"I will. Don't you fear monkey man," Rosalie replied, taking their long drive at a sensible speed. Alice had always wondered where that nickname had come from and decided that now, as an almost comfortable silence settled over the three of them was a good time to ask,

"Why do you call him that?"

"Huh?" Rosalie asked as she pulled out onto the main road and headed into Forks, speeding up a little now that they were on a main road.

"Why do you call him Monkey Man? I mean he's not overly hairy and before you say something crude Emmett McCarthy Cullen I mean on your head and your arms," Alice pointed a finger at him as she leant forwards between the two front seats. Emmett laughed loudly and didn't stop as Rosalie answered,

"No it's not because of that," she said, "Remember when were fourteen and there was that great party that I really, really wanted to go to? The one the seniors were having?" Alice nodded. She remembered. "And remember how Carlisle said I couldn't go?" Another nod. Rosalie had screamed and sulked like any good teenage girl would. "Well Emmett snuck me out, carried me down the tree outside my widow on his back and we went to the party."

"You went?" Alice asked in surprise.

"Yeah, thanks to my monkey man and his climbing abilities," Rosalie said, rubbing Emmett's arm fondly.

"So…how was the party?" Alice asked.

"Oh it was good. We got a little bit tipsy and that's where we had our first kiss," Rosalie smiled broadly at the memory. Emmett nodded in agreement, his laugher stopping as her took Rosalie's little hand in his own big on. "What the…? Someone's out walking in this?" She was peering ahead of them and sure enough there was a solitary figure walking down the side of the road.

"He must be soaked," Alice said worriedly as they got closer, "Should we stop and give him a lift?"

"Alice, think of the upholstery," Rosalie said, nodding to the cream leather seats and matching cream carpets, all perfect without a spot of dirt, "No."

"But Rose I feel so guilty, we can't just drive past him," Alice said pleadingly, "The car can be cleaned can't it? What if he get's pneumonia walking in weather like this?" Alice asked.

"Then it's his own silly fault," Rosalie answered.

"Rose."

"Fine. But you're cleaning my car and if he turns out o be an axe murderer I'm hiding behind you as this was your idea," Rosalie told her, waiting until she had just passed the guy before indicating and pulling over. Alice opened her door and stuck her head out.

"Need a lift?" she asked before frowning, "I know you, you're in all my classes. Are you walking to school?" The guy, still walking towards them nodded, water shaking out of his drenched hair as he did so. "Jasper right? Get in, we'll give you a lift to school."

"But I'm soaked," he said quietly.

"Get in," Alice ordered, sliding over the back seat of the car so that he could get in without having to go round. He did so slowly, looking uncomfortable.

"Thank you," he said quietly, mostly to Rose.

"Thank her, she's the one who's agreed the clean the car," Rosalie said with a shrug as he shut the door. Then they were on there way again. Alice smiled as Jasper turned, probably to thank her but instead he just stopped and stared at her. She didn't mind as at that moment her mind shut down too as she gazed into the most beautiful blue eyes she'd ever seen.

A/N There we are, The Cullen kids are in the story just like I planned them to be. So? What do you think?


	4. Chapter 4

Disclaimer: I don't own Twilight or the characters in it. They belong entirely to Stephanie. I'm just borrowing them for a little while.

A/N All human in this story.

Warning: Child Abuse.

Rescue Me

A/N I must say a big thank you to my reviewers, wasn't expecting quite such a response to this story if I'm honest.

A/N 2 Rather a lot of swearing towards the end of this chapter. You with delicate ears have been warned.

Chapter Four. 

She was possibly the most beautiful person Jasper had ever seen and his heart began to beat painfully hard in his chest. Her wild dark hair looked sinfully soft and his fingers itched to touch it, to move softly through the short strands. Instead he clenched his good hand into a fist against his thigh, looking quickly away from her hair to get rid of the temptation. But looking away turned out to be a big mistake as instead of her soft hair he found himself staring at her plump lips, red and shiny from lip-gloss. Idly he wondered what flavour she used…she didn't seem like the fruity kind…maybe he should just lean over and…

"No," Jasper whispered to himself, pushing his back against the seat.

"What was that?" she asked and he almost moaned out loud at the sound of her beautiful voice, so much clearer now that he was out of the rain. It reminded him of the most beautiful bird song in the world.

"Nothing." His accent sounded even rougher now and for the first time in a long while he felt embarrassed by his thick Southern accent and gruff voice. Usually he didn't care. Usually no one spoke to him.

She smiled at him then and he found his gaze following her smile up her rosy cheeks until he found himself gazing into her beautiful green eyes. He felt himself drowning in them but he didn't care. He knew he was staring like a weirdo but he really didn't care, she was too beautiful for him to care.

"Are you alright?" she asked worriedly, shifting a little in her seat as if his staring was making her uncomfortable. He snapped his gaze away in an instant, watching the rain moving on the car window instead, muttering a quick 'yes'. He could feel her frown burning into the back of his head and had to elaborate,

"Just a bit cold." And he was he realised, he was very cold in fact. His body was trembling with shivers and his fingers were all turning a disturbing shade of blue.

"Rose, turn the heating up would you?" his rescuer asked the stunning blond driving the very nice and extremely expensive car.

"It's already up full, Alice," Rose replied.

"Oh, ok." Alice. The beautiful girl was called Alice. Jasper couldn't help smiling about her name, as beautiful as she. He was till smiling when a pair of gloves hit him in the face, thrown by the monster of a boy in the front passenger seat. Jasper had only just noticed how…big the other boy was. Not fat or anything, just…big.

"Emmett!" Alice gasped angrily.

"Sorry mate, wasn't aiming for your face. Just thought you could use my gloves more than me. I'm toasty warm," Emmett said cheerfully.

"Oh, thanks," Jasper mumbled, trying to pick them up but he soon found himself unable to. His bad hand was understandably useless but he couldn't get his good hand to work either. It was so cold!

"Let me help," Alice offered cheerfully, taking the gloves from where they had fallen in his lap. She easily slipped the glove onto his good hand, her warm fingers making him gasp for more than one reason. Then she asked for his other hand and frowned at the state it was in, "What happened?"

"I got it stuck in a door," he shrugged, acting as casual as possible.

"Ow! She winced for him.

"Yeah," he smiled softly, looking at her face as she pulled the glove on over the cast with stubborn determination. In the end it was lucky they were so big and knitted, it meant she could stretch one of the fingers to fit over the two splinted ones. The empty one flopped a bit and made him smile slightly at how odd it looked. "Thank you Alice."

"Your welcome."

There was a comfortable silence for the rest of the journey to Forks High and Jasper was pretty warm when the car pulled into one of the best spots in the car park. The others were sweltering but said nothing, even Rosalie. After watching his teeth chatter behind blue lips in the rear view mirror she'd felt rather sorry for him

"Alice, pass me my umbrella would you?" Rosalie asked and her sister obeyed as Jasper opened his car door, stepping out into the rain unprotected. Instantly he was cold again. Emmett followed, rushing round to hold the umbrella for his girlfriend while Alice held her own.

"Here Jasper, hide under here with me," Alice said as the lights of the car flashed twice, signalling that it was locked.

"I should just get to class," Jasper said quietly, "Thank you for the lift…oh the gloves. Do you want your gloves back?" This was said to Emmett who was even bigger now that he was standing up.

"Nah, keep em mate," Emmett grinned at him, "After all the trouble little Alice went to get them on that hand of yours you'd better keep them." And Alice really was little, Jasper hadn't noticed until Emmett said it. She was positively tiny except in…well the right places. Jasper flushed and looked away as quickly as he could, muttering a thanks to Emmett and turning to go.

"What's your first class?" Alice asked, skipping up beside him and slipping her arm through his, her umbrella sheltering him. "And what year are you?"

"Junior…" Jasper muttered quietly.

"Me too!" Alice gasped happily, "So first class?"

"Er…History with Mr Roberts," Jasper answered.

"Me too!" Alice cried happily. "How come I never noticed you before?"

"I don't know," Jasper answered awkwardly.

"Well I'm glad I've noticed you now," Alice giggled happily. Jasper heard Emmett laugh loudly behind them and say none too quietly to Rosalie,

"Alice isn't subtle is she? In a moment she'll rip the guys pants off."

"Emmett, don't be so mean," Rosalie scolded him but the remark had already hit his mark. Alice was blushing bright red and Jasper's mind had gone completely and utterly blank. Alice…liked him? Was that possible?

"Let's get to History," Alice said eagerly, most likely eager to get away from Emmett and his comments. Jasper found himself being pulled to the correct building and released only briefly so she could shut the umbrella before he was pulled towards their history classroom. And all the while Alice talked and Jasper found himself hypnotised by her voice, so much so that he lost track of what she was talking about almost instantly. He was sure she'd said something that required an answer but she ploughed on despite his silence. Everyone stared at them as they entered the history room, arms still linked. A few of their mouths actually dropped open in shock. There were also quite a few glares from the boys. "Sit with me?"

"Huh?" Jasper asked.

"Sit with me?"

"Ok," Jasper mumbled, following her to the desk she usually sat at alone, a desk on the other side of the room to his usual desk.

"Morning class!" Mr Roberts said cheerfully as he walked into the classroom, his arms holding a pile of papers, "Now I have you last test papers, all graded and may I just say class that I was highly impressed by a few of them, so when I call your names out on the register today I want you to come up and collect yours." This said he put the papers down on the desk and picked up the register.

He started with the A's…

…then went through the B's…

…and then came the C's…

"Alice Cullen."

Cheerfully Alice skipped up to the teacher's desk as Jaspers heart dropped into his stomach. Alice **Cullen** …Dr **Cullen** …the connection was made like a sledge hammer to his head…she was the doctor's daughter!

"Oh God…"

They had only been nice to him out of pity.

Their father must have told them everything about him.

He must have told them to befriend him.

Probably all with the hopes of getting him to admit that…that…

Hell the good Dr probably gave them his address so that they could conveniently give him a lift!

Oh they made him so angry!

Furiously he pulled the gloves from his hands, uncaring of how his broken fingers were jerked roughly and sent waves of pain up his arm. As he was doing this Alice, still smiling, sat beside him. And that set him off,

"Oh you're really something you know that?" he growled at her as the register continued. Alice's face changed instantly from a smile to a look of shock. "Don't play the innocent with me! I know what you and your fucking family and your fucking father are doing! I thought you were actually being nice to me. I thought…I thought…bloody hell I was so stupid! Why would you have thought anything remotely like that?" Jasper asked, his voice raising rapidly as Alice and now the rest of the class stared at him in shock. The register was forgotten. "But you don't need to pretend any more Alice Fucking Cullen! I know what you're doing! I know what your dad told you to do! I think you're a right little devious bitch to do it!" Jasper was sounding more and more like his dad each second and no matter how much he hated that he found he couldn't stop. "You can tell your father that I don't need his help nor his pity nor his fucking children interfering with my life! And don't try talking to me again you evil little cow! You make me sick!"

And with that he threw the gloves in her face with as much force as he could, jumped up to his feet and stormed out of the room. He ran once he was out of the room, ran out of the school and into the rain. The tears began then, tears of anger and of pain and of a soul deep hurt…he should have known…he should have known no luck would ever come his way. His legs gave out on him and he collapsed, sitting on the curb he put his head in his hands and really began to sob.

A/N You hate me don't you?


	5. Chapter 5

Disclaimer: I don't own Twilight or the characters in it. They belong entirely to Stephanie. I'm just borrowing them for a little while.

A/N All human in this story.

Warning: Child Abuse.

Rescue MeChapter Five

"It feels much better now Dr Cullen," the adorable little ten year old girl said in answer to his question on how her broken arm felt, "And thank you for the pink cast, it's lovely." Her mother smiled ruefully and shook her head. Carlisle could understand why, little Becky was wearing nothing but pink and her schoolbag was pink and her school stationary was pink…apparently even her bedroom and it's entire contents was pink, Becky had proudly described everything in great detail as her arm had been seen to.

"Well then you're free to go home and I'll see you next Monday. And remember to look after that arm like I told you," Carlisle said with a kind smile for both Becky and her worried mother. He then left the Nurses to deal with the rest of the paperwork and headed back to his office to write up his report, everything was forms and papers and reports these days. He'd been typing quickly for about five minutes when his phone rang; the screen telling him it was an outside call. Saving his file he picked up the black phone, "Dr Cullen speaking."

"Stay the fuck out of my life!" He knew that voice…

"Jasper…"

"I don't need your help. I don't need your pity! And I don't need you interfering with my life!" Carlisle heart lurched as he heard the boy choke back a loud sob. "It's my life and my problems! Stick to your own!" The boy hung up, obviously slamming the phone down on his end as a loud bang in his ear made Carlisle wince.

"What the…?" Carlisle asked himself quietly, wondering what had happened to upset the boy so much, wondering what Jasper thought he had done…

"Carlisle! We're needed in the ER!"

Pushing his worry for Jasper aside temporarily Carlisle followed his fellow doctor out of his office and took off for the ER as quick as they could.

As he drove home Carlisle thought of Jasper and that phone call, running what was said over and over again in his mind, trying to think of something he had done that would have affected the boy like that. He couldn't think of anything. Parking his car in the garage he hit the button for the automatic doors to close as he headed inside the house, the unusually quiet house. Where was the music and the laughter?

"What's wrong?" he asked Esme as he bent to kiss her on the cheek as she washed up by hand at the sink, something she did when she was upset. She sighed deeply before answering,

"Someone at school has said something about the children. It's upset Alice so much she's not said a word to anyone all day and has locked herself in her room." Esme slipped off the unattractive rubber gloves and Carlisle pulled her into his arms, his worry increasing rapidly. Alice not talking? Alice talked about everything! When she was happy or sad, when she was hyper (especially when she was hyper), when she was depressed, when she was hurt…Alice always talked!

"Who was this someone?" Carlisle asked.

"Rosalie told me it was a boy that they kindly gave a life to school," Esme mumbled into his shoulder, "Carlisle I'm really worried about Alice, this really isn't like her. If someone had upset her she'd have told us. Why is she…?"

"Esme, what as the boys name?" Carlisle asked, a sinking feeling of dread growing in his stomach. First the phone call from Jasper and now this…it was too much of a coincidence.

"I can't remember. Rosalie knows it," Esme said, pulling away from him and taking a tissue out of her pocket to wipe away the streaks of mascara her tears had put on her cheeks. Fondly he cupped her cheeks in his hands and brushed the pads of his thumb over the smooth skin once she'd wiped away the black marks.

"Where is she?" Carlisle asked, his thumbs still stroking her skin.

"Computer."

"I'll talk to Rosalie and then I'll go up and see if Alice will talk to me," Carlisle said, kissing his wife's lips softly before heading towards the family computer in the living room. As he walked he heard Esme return to the washing up. "Rosalie?" He called out to his blond daughter who was watching something on Youtube, the computers headphones on. "Rosalie?" He pulled the headphones away from her ears and she turned around indignantly.

"Oh it's you dad, I thought it was Edward again. He keeps bugging me even though he knows it's my turn," Rosalie huffed in annoyance. "All he wants to do is IM Bella, as if he doesn't spend enough time talking to her already." Carlisle smiled down at Rosalie. His blond daughter hadn't liked Bella at first but mostly now her moaning and complaining was just an act to cover up the fact that the girl who had stolen Edwards's heart was growing on her.

"Rosalie, can you tell me what's upset Alice today?" Carlisle asked.

"I can tell you what I've heard," Rosalie conceded, "None of us were actually there when it happened but the whole school was talking about it by the end of the day." Carlisle perched on the edge of the desk to listen, "We gave this boy a life to school and he seemed quite nice, shy but nice. Turned out he was in Alice's first class so she offered to walk there with him. I think she liked him."

"Go on," Carlisle nodded his head.

"This is the bit that's just gossip as none of use were in the class with them," Rosalie reminded him, "Well apparently she sat with this boy which caused a scandal of it's own, a Cullen girl with a nobody and all that. You know how high school kids are. Anyway for no apparent reason he blew up in her face, swearing at her and shouting at her. He even called her a B-I-T-C-H! And then he just stormed out of the class and one of the supply teachers saw him leaving the school grounds."

"What was his name?" Carlisle asked, having a tough time believing that Alice could have given anyone a reason to shout at her. Alice was just too nice.

"Jasper something. Alice knew him but I didn't recognise him," Rosalie answered, confirming Carlisle's suspicions. Something had happened to make Jasper mad not only at him but at Alice as well and he had a horrible suspicion it was something so simple as finding out Alice was his daughter. Jasper's earlier words came back to him,

"…I don't need you interfering with my life…"

He hadn't interfered with his life, not on purpose. But his children HAD given the boy a lift to school. He couldn't have thought…surely he wouldn't have thought…

"I'm going to go try and talk to Alice," Carlisle said finally.

"Good luck, I've never seen her like this before. Emmett even offered to let her give him the girliest make-over she could manage and still we got the silent treatment," Rosalie said, looking back to the computer screen. Now that really was serious. Carlisle ran a soothing hand down Rosalie's soft hair before heading upstairs and along the corridor till he was standing outside of Alice's room.

"Alice?" he asked as he knocked, "Alice let me in honey."

"Alice please let me in? I want to talk to you about what happened today, I want to try and help," Carlisle said loudly, knocking again.

"Go away," the little mumble was only just heard but in the room behind him, Emmett's room, there was a little cheer of,

"She spoke!"

"Alice please let me in," Carlisle kept his tone gentle but loud. The minutes ticked by as he stood outside her door until eventually he heard the lock click and the door was opened. He stepped into the room as Alice flung herself back down onto her bed, her face pressed into her pillow. "Oh Alice sweetheart, tell me what's wrong." Carlisle said softly as he sat beside her on the bed, his hand beginning to rub up and down her back in a soothing motion.

"Didn't-Rosalie-tell-you?" Alice asked with little gasps between the words.

"She told the me the gossip," Carlisle corrected, "I want to hear what really happened from you. What's upset you so much sweetheart?" The back rubbing continued even though she rolled over slightly to face him, her red cheeks and bloodshot eyes on display to him.

"We-We gave Jasper a lift to school," she began slowly, "And it was all good and he was really nice and…and well I might have flirted a little," a shy smile broke out then only to be quickly killed off by her sad look, "We went to history and Mr Roberts started the register. After he said my name Jasper just…freaked. He was so horrible," two tears fell from her eyes and Carlisle pulled his handkerchief out of his pocket, gently dabbing at the tears until they were gone.

"What did he say to you?" he asked as he put the hankie down on her pillow.

"He said he knew what we were doing, 'scept when he shouted it at me he swore," Alice gulped and rubbed at her eyes, "He said he knew what you told me to-to do and-and he called me a 'right little devious bitch'." A little sob escaped her, "I don't know what he meant! I was just being nice to him!"

"Did he say anything else Alice?" Carlisle asked.

"He said that I should tell you that he didn't need your help or your pity or-or your children interfering with my-with his life. And then he called me an evil little cow, that I made him sick and that I shouldn't try to talk to him again. He said this in front of the whole class, the whole school was talking about it," a loud sob escaped her now and the tears began anew, "What did I do to him?"

"Oh Alice baby come here," Carlisle pulled her into his arms and she sobbed into his shoulder, her hands clutching at his shirt as he rocked her back and forth. "You didn't do anything Alice. I did."

"You did?" Alice blinked up at him tearfully.

"I treated his hand last night," Carlisle explained sadly, "And I called Chief Swan to the hospital to meet him because I suspected he wasn't telling the entire truth about how he got the injury."

"What?" Alice asked, understandably confused.

"We offered to help him but he refused, he told us that he didn't need help. I can only assume that when he found out that you were my daughter he thought that I had instructed you to befriend him so that he would let me and Charlie help him…"

"But you wouldn't do something like that!" Alice gasped, sitting up straight.

"I know that and you know that but he doesn't know that," Carlisle said, still speaking softly, "I'm sorry honey but in a way it's my fault he shouted at you like that. I pushed the subject last night and he took it out on you."

"Do you-do you think he's being hurt at home?" Alice asked fearfully.

"I'm afraid so," Carlisle nodded sadly.

"And you think he really thought that you told us to…"

"Yes."

"Well then," Alice's stance changed now from indignant to pure determination, "We'll have to sort that out won't we?"

"Alice…?" Carlisle asked worriedly.

"Next time I see him we're going to have a little talk and I'm going to clear up all the misunderstandings," Alice said strongly.

"Be gentle with him Alice," Carlisle said, again sounding worried.

"I will be."

A/N There we go, another chapter. Another soon to follow I hope.


	6. Chapter 6

Disclaimer: I don't own Twilight or the characters in it. They belong entirely to Stephanie. I'm just borrowing them for a little while.

A/N All human in this story.

Warning: Child Abuse.

Rescue Me

Chapter Six.

The front door slamming woke him from his drink induced sleep, the sounded crashing round his skull and making his hangover feel even worse. Rolling over he was unprepared for how close he was to the edge of the bed and founding himself falling the two feet to the floor.

"Ah fuck…" he moaned as he struggled to his feet, one hand holding the side of his head in attempt to get his brain to stop pounding against the sides of his skull. Footsteps thundered up the stairs.

The boy was home.

Looking at the clock he frowned as deeply as his hangover would allow, what the fuck was the boy doing home at half nine? It was a school day…wasn't it? Yes, yes it was, it was Wednesday. The boy should be at school. Why wasn't he?

Before he could demand an answer he heard the boy run down the stairs again, his feet even louder than before making his temples pound even worse…God he needed an aspirin. Stumbling out of his room he was half way down the stairs when the boy began to shout,

"Stay the fuck out of my life!"

"How dare you-" he began, hurrying down the rest of the stairs and into the hall only to stop sharply, both physically and verbally when he saw the boy on the phone in the living room. He wasn't talking to him…but if he wasn't talking to him who the fuck was he talking to?

"I don't need your help. I don't need your pity! And I don't need you interfering with my life!"

The boy was crying as he shouted down the phone. How pathetic.

But wait…who was he talking to? What did he mean by that? Had he told someone something he shouldn't have?

His fists clenched at his sides seemingly of their own accord.

"It's my life and my problems! Stick to your own!"

The boy slammed the phone down, sobbing pathetically now.

"Who the fuck have you told?" he finally demanded of the boy, blocking the only door in and out of the living room. The boys eyes widened in panic, obviously he'd thought he'd still be passed out.

"N-No one…"

The boy backed away from him until his back was pressed against one of the walls, knocking the photo behind him so it hung at an odd angle.

"Then who the fuck were you just talking to?"

The boy flinched as his voice raised angrily, wide blue eyes moving from his angry face to his clenched fists before he stuttered out a reply,

"N-No one…the doctor…the doctor guessed and…"

His right fist slammed into the boys jaw and he stumbled to the side, knocking the photo off the wall completely. Unbalanced it took only another light punch to the side of his head to have him tumbling to the floor at his feet.

"You told a doctor!"

"No dad! He guessed! Please dad, please…" He cowered, arms hiding his head, legs curled up to protect his stomach. "I told him you didn't…you wouldn't…I told him I didn't need help…please dad…"

"You lied to him?" he asked suspiciously.

"Yes dad…"

"Like you lied to me?" he demanded.

"No!" the boy gasped.

"Oh yes you did boy, you lied to me. I asked you if anyone suspected when you went to the hospital and you told me that no one did," he spoke in a remarkably calm voice considering the amount of anger that was growing inside of him. "You lied to me."

"Please dad…" the boy sobbed loudly.

"You lied to me!"

He kicked to the boy hard in the leg, making him cry out. Another kick followed to his arm and then another to his stomach as it was momentarily unprotected and another to his leg and another to his arm, all the while he growled down at the crying boy,

"Never-ever-lie-to-me!"

"I'm sorry! I'm sorry!"

Eventually he stopped, leaving the boy whimpering on the ground as he stumbled into the kitchen to find an aspirin…and a beer. When he returned to the living room, chilled beer in hand he found the boy still lying where he'd left him. "Clean up the mess you've made," he ordered as he sat in his favourite chair and searched down its sides for the television remote. The boy stumbled up, picking up the photo first and re-hanging it. As he did that Ethan Whitlock lost interest in his search for the remote, staring instead at the photo now hanging on the wall.

She was beautiful, staring out at him with those big blue eyes, her blond hair curling about her shoulders, caught forever in a bouncing motion as she'd played with the baby on her hip. The baby with those same blue eyes and that same blond hair. His wife, Emily Whitlock and his son, the boy, Jasper Whitlock. The boy was the spitting image of her, one of the many things he hated him for.

The photo had been taken on the boy's first birthday back when everything was perfect, when he had a good job with the Army, when his wife was young and carefree, when his life was filled with happiness.

A long time ago, a time he'd almost forgotten.

Seven years after that photo had been taken his wife had left him in the cruellest way possible and it was all that boys fault! He'd been riding that stupid bike he'd begged and begged for…hadn't been able to control it…he'd swerved into the road…she'd rushed out…pushed him out of the way…

A physical shudder shook his body as he remembered the sight and the sound of his wife being hit by the lorry that should have hit his son. His son, he'd stood there screaming and bawling, staring at what remained of his mother. Ethan hadn't had time for him, had shoved him out of his way roughly, hadn't wanted to touch him.

The Doctor's had told him she'd died instantly, that she wouldn't have felt the pain of all her injuries. It was meant to comfort him but it didn't. Neither did the ever present comment that she'd died to save his son. How he wished she hadn't! She was his life! She was the thing that kept him going, kept him sane…not that boy.

He hadn't let the boy come to the funeral.

Hate had replaced any tiny bit of love he'd felt for his son and the drinking had replaced his wife. Eventually the drinking got so bad the army let him go, dishonourable discharge for drinking while on duty. He'd beaten the boy hard that night, it was his fault, everything that had happened was his fault. They'd moved and now no one knew about his hate of the boy, only of his drinking, to the town of Forks he was a bum and an alcoholic surviving on benefits. Or at least they had until now.

The boys fault again.

And he'd been punished like he should be.

But he could never punish him enough for taking away the one thing that made the world all right, that made being alive all right.

"Why couldn't it have been you?" he asked out loud like he had many times before, starting not long after her death.

"I don't know dad," the boy sighed sadly just like always before leaving the room, leaving Ethan alone to drink his way though the day.

A/N That came out of nowhere and wouldn't leave me alone. Sheesh I sorta wanna feel sorry for him but I really, really can't! And I wrote him! Hope it doesn't disappoint. (Sorry it's a bit short.)


	7. Chapter 7

Disclaimer: I don't own Twilight or the characters in it. They belong entirely to Stephanie. I'm just borrowing them for a little while.

A/N All human in this story.

Warning: Child Abuse.

Rescue Me

A/N Ok this is a note to say thank you to all my reviewers. I have to say I'm a little overwhelmed. Usually I get a load of criticism but you lot, well you actually like it. Hope this chapter measures up.

Enjoy!

Chapter Seven.

One - find Jasper

Two - don't let Jasper get away and/or avoid me

Three - tell Jasper he's an idiot (possibly with a little more compassion/tact)

Four - get him to believe what I tell him (repeat many, many times if necessary)

Five - discretely interrogate him about -

"Alice, you're never discrete about anything," Emmett laughed loudly as he read Alice's neat handwriting over her shoulder. Covering it with her hands quickly she glared at him. "And anyway you forgot the all important first step, spend an hour fantasising about him naked."

"Emmett!" Alice turned and pushed him away from her as roughly as she could considering she was practically half his size. And she was sitting down while he was standing. Her big brother laughed loudly as he went off to find his Rose. Alice huffed in annoyance and turned back to her notebook, picking up the pen.

Five - discretely interrogate him about -

But she could get no further because all she could think about, literally all that was going around and around in her mind was Jasper. Naked. Now that Emmett had put that thought in her head…well apparently her brain had decided that nothing else was needed for the moment. It was quite a nice thought. He looked like he had smooth skin and Alice wondered if it would feel soft under her fingers. Would he be freckled? She didn't think so. Hairy? She didn't mind. A sigh left her lips as her imagination travelled lower. What would his-

"Alice honey, are you alright? You've gone all red," Esme asked worriedly. Alice jumped in her chair, an 'eep' escaping her. What had she been doing? Imagining his…his…well! It was all Emmett's fault! He was the one that put those thoughts into her head!

"I'm fine," she said quickly, "It's…just little warm in here…is all."

She flew to her room then, blushing furiously having been caught practically fantasising about Jasper naked. Oh she could kill Emmett for putting that thought in her head! Now the next time she saw him that would be the first thing she thought of instead of the all important plan she'd made to sort out the mistake between them.

To get her mind to think about something more appropriate she put on her latest CD, bought the previous weekend (John Barrowman - Music Music Music), selected her favourite track (10 - I Know Him So Well) and began planning her outfit for the next day. Now Alice wasn't one to over stress about appearance usually, she was no Rosalie. But such an event as righting a wrong required a carefully thought out and precisely planned outfit. Finding the perfect outfit took her mind of Jaspers body, thankfully and she worked on the outfit until tea time and then continued to work on it after she'd eaten, putting the finishing touches to it only just before going to bed.

She'd chosen a black summer dress with white roses on it. There were two layers to it, the top on a see-through gauze material and the bottom a plain black material that kept her decent. Around the bottom of the dress were large ruffles and between her breasts two strips of fabric had been knotted and the tassels hung down the front. It was only knee length so with it she was going to wear her usual grey tights, the ones that cut of just below the knee. On her feet she was going to wear her silver dolly shoes, the sparkly ones, not the plain ones. Over the dress she had picked out a white cardigan to wear that tied up at her waist instead of buttoning up. Choosing her accessories had taken her an hour alone. In the end she'd chosen silver bangles for her left wrist, a set with fake diamonds set in little patterns on them and a swirl-patterned silver wring for her right hand. And of course she would wear the choker like always, she'd made it herself when she was officially adopted by Dr Cullen, finding his family crest and painting it on the little oval of wood she used to hold the choker together at the front. Secretly she was working on making a Cullen crest for her family to wear, or rather she'd convinced someone who was taking metal works at school to make them for her after designing them. Her hair would of course stick out madly as usual, it wouldn't go any other way but she was going to wear her white lace hair band to give a little order to it.

(This is actually a description of a fancy dress outfit that I have created for my friends 21st Birthday Party. It's what I see Alice going to a party in.)

Hopefully the outfit would come across as nice, friendly and maybe a little sexy. What? She wanted him to notice her in that way too! Lying in her bed, dressed in her 'Hello Kitty' pyjama's she looked at the outfit hanging on her wardrobe in the moonlight, before closing her eyes and waiting to fall asleep.

Her clocked ticked loudly as the time went by and eventually she sighed, rolling onto her back and staring at the ceiling. Then she rolled onto her other side and stared at the wall. Then she lay on her front. Then her back again. Then her left side again. Eventually she sighed loudly, sat up and switched her bedside light on, looking at the ticking clock. 2:00am.

Getting up from her bed she went and sat at her desk, looking down at the still unfinished written plan. Something was keeping her from going to sleep, either her worry over what Jasper thought of her, worry over what was happening to Jasper, maybe even this unfinished plan! Whatever it was she couldn't sleep.

"Well I can finish the plan at least. And there won't be anything about fantasising about him naked in it," she grumbled to herself, picking up her pen.

One - find Jasper

Two - don't let Jasper get away and/or avoid me

Three - tell Jasper he's an idiot (possibly with a little more compassion/tact)

Four - get him to believe what I tell him (repeat many, many times if necessary)

Five - discretely interrogate him about his home life

Six - get him to hang out with me and be my friend

Plan finished she found she was still not in the least bit tired and so put her Ipod on, picked up her book and settled on her bed to read until she fell asleep.

Alice was woken by her 6:00am alarm after only two hours sleep, the light still on, her Ipod still playing in her ear and her book on the floor, dropped over the side of the bed by her hand when she finally nodded off. She rubbed at her eyes before getting up and getting dressed, spinning in front of the mirror once as a sort of final check of the outfit. Yes, it would do perfectly. Acting as bright as ever she skipped down to breakfast.

"Morning!" she sang loudly.

"Morning sweetheart," Esme replied as ever. The rest of the morning was just like always, the boys half asleep still even though they'd gotten more sleep than she had, Rosalie fussing to get her make-up absolutely perfect and Carlisle worrying about a patient he was to see that day.

"Not picking up Bella today Edward?" Esme asked as she put the stack of toast down in the centre of the table and everyone helped themselves to a slice.

"No, she's driving herself in today," Edward answered casually.

So when the time came to leave for school they all piled into Edwards car like they always did on the days he wasn't with Bella, Alice in the front passenger seat so that Rosalie and Emmett could be all couple-like in the back seat. There was chatter in the car but Alice for once didn't join in, worrying about what lay ahead for the day. It could after all be difficult getting him to believe her.

They arrived at school and Alice was immediately on the look out of Jasper. She ignored all of her other friends in favour of searching him out but…he wasn't there. He didn't come to school that day. Or the next day (which she had to choose another outfit for) or the next day (yet another outfit choice) or the next and then it was the weekend.

"I'm worried," Alice confided in Carlisle as she leant against the kitchen counter, watching him make a very thick tomato and salad sandwich. Carlisle was a vegetarian and had been for many years, Esme too had been a vegetarian since she was a teenager. Neither of them had expected their children to become vegetarians when they moved into their house, they'd never insisted that they changed their diet. The four children had all done it by their own choice and now they were a family of vegetarians. Amazingly Edward had also chosen a vegetarian girl to fall for.

"What about Alice?" Carlisle asked, trying not to cut his fingers off as he cut the sandwich in half with an exceedingly sharp knife.

"Jasper."

"What about him?" Carlisle asked, putting the knife in the almost full dishwasher. The plate his sandwich was on would join it once he'd eaten.

"He didn't come to school for the rest of the week so either he's avoiding me…well us on purpose and he really doesn't seem the type of person to do that or…or something's wrong," Alice said, her voice getting quiet with worry at the end. "You don't think his dad's done something really bad to him do you?"

"I'd have been called," Carlisle told her reassuringly.

"But what if he's hurt himself?" Alice asked worriedly, the thought suddenly crashing into her brain, "What if he hasn't come to school because he's killed himself? Oh God…"

"Alice. Calm down. If he'd killed himself Charlie would have been called and he would have called me," Carlisle said, putting his hands on her shoulders and ignoring the rumbling in his stomach. This was far more important. "And I don't think Jasper is the sort of person to take that way out."

"More like you hope he isn't the sort of person…"

"Alice. He hasn't killed himself," Carlisle said sternly.

"But you can't know that!" Alice cried tearfully.

"Wait here and calm down," Carlisle ordered, hurrying up to his office and returning with a file, "I was going to wait until Monday to call him but I can do it now to make you feel better." He picked up the phone from it's stand and checking the file pushed the buttons firmly before bringing it up to his ear. "Hello Jasper? It's Dr Cullen. No don't hang up! I'm calling about scheduling a check up for your wrist. Jasper I just want to help you. No I did not…" he took the phone away, hitting the end call button, "He hung up."

"How did he sound?" Alice asked.

"Angry," Carlisle answered, "But most definitely alive."

"Ok," Alice breathed in relief before giving a huff of annoyance, "So he is avoiding me." Taking one half oh Carlisle's sandwich she bit into it before heading up to her room leaving Carlisle nodding slowly, thankful that she was back to normal. Normal here being stealing half of his lunch.

Monday morning found a very annoyed and thoroughly determined Alice getting out of Edwards car, dressed in that first outfit she'd chosen and recycled. Jasper would be at school today, she was certain of it. Simply because any more time of school and the school would be calling to get a doctor's note from him and a reason for his absence. Looking around almost confidently she spotted him walking towards one of the buildings across the car park.

"See you later, I've got some serious talking to do," she said to her family before rushing over to Jasper. Giving him no time to argue she grabbed his good arms sleeve and pulled him away from the school, down on the road into town again.

"What are you doing?" Jasper demanded angrily and a little surprised. Alice dragged him a little further and then stopped, keeping hold of his sleeve and face him,

"We need to talk."

A/N There we go. Sorry this took so long but I've been really ill, throwing my guts up and being really dizzy are not the most helpful things when it comes to writing. Tell me what you think and what you'd like to happen in the future.


	8. Chapter 8

Disclaimer: I don't own Twilight or the characters in it. They belong entirely to Stephanie. I'm just borrowing them for a little while.

A/N All human in this story.

Warning: Child Abuse.

Rescue Me

Chapter Eight. 

_(I) "What are you doing?" Jasper demanded angrily and a little surprised. Alice dragged him a little further and then stopped, keeping hold of his sleeve and face him,_

_"We need to talk." (I)_

"No we don't," Jasper shook his head as he looked down at the girl who had hurt him so much a week ago. Pulling his arm out of her grip he turned to walked

"Whatever you think it's not true!" Alice cried out, rushing around so that she blocked his path, her hands pressing against his chest lightly, "Whatever you think I've done I assure you I didn't." He pushed her out of the way roughly, so roughly she slammed into the wall of the building they were in front of and she cried out in both surprise and pain. "My father didn't tell me to be friends with you."

"Like hell he didn't!" he glared at her as she moved away from the wall, rubbing her right arm. She was wearing a strapless dress and his heart gave a lurch as he saw the bloody scratches on her arm from the rough brick. He'd hurt her…he'd lashed out and hurt her…he…he was like his father. That realisation killed all the anger she'd brought out in him, replacing it with disgust, "Leave me alone, it doesn't mater anyway." He walked towards the school but once again she blocked his path, speaking almost too quickly for him to understand,

"It does matter because you think I did something that I would never dream of doing! My dad doesn't talk about his work at home and he'd never ask us to befriend someone because he was worried about them. And you should know that he worries about a lot of people. You don't have to feel like he's singling you out. He cares about everyone on the planet but he can only ever help a few and if he's chosen to help you then you should know that he won't stop until he succeeds in helping you and I can't let you slander his name by saying the things you did. And I wont let you call me a…call me a bitch without proper cause. I mean if I am being a bitch people should call me a bitch. But I was not being a bitch. I was just trying to make friends with the hot guy who I'd never really paid attention to before but decided that I should and-"

"Stop talking," he interrupted her loudly, "Please."

Alice took a long deep breath and stared up at him, tears building in her eyes,

"And I'm not evil," she finished much quieter and slower.

"If and this is a big if, if I believe you why did you stop to help me?" he asked with a frown, holding back the three raging emotions he felt, each as strong as the next. Disgust at himself for behaving just like the person he hated, anger at his father and her father and amusement. How could this strange little girl who could talk for a remarkably long time without breathing not amuse anyone?

"Because I wanted to."

"That's it?" he asked quietly.

"It was raining and you didn't even have a waterproof coat on! I couldn't just drive past when we had an empty seat in the car. That's just cruel! And I believe in karma, you know do a good thing; earn a good thing in return or something like that. Although admittedly I must have built up some bad karma somewhere to earn such a tongue lashing from you…" she ended in little more than a mutter.

"Your father didn't tell you to make friends with me? Out of pity or curiosity or whatever?" he asked slowly.

"No! He wouldn't do that," Alice told him stubbornly just as the school bell rang loudly. They were both now officially late, "Yeah he told me he's worried about you. He told me he wants to help but not once did he tell me to talk to you. I only found out he knew you, or rather that he'd treated you after you said all that. He calmed me down, talked to me…"

"Calmed you down?" Jasper asked, the information seeming to take forever to sink in. Could she be speaking the truth? Could the Doctor be a good guy? Could she have really been acting in innocent friendship only? Could he have severely got everything muddled up?

"What you said hurt," Alice admitted quietly.

"I-I'm…I'm sorry I hurt you," Jasper said quietly, "But I thought…"

"I know. You thought I was acting as my dads puppet to get the information out of you so that he and Charlie could help you get away," Alice said bluntly. His heart practically froze in his chest and he argued quickly,

"I don't need to get away from anything! I tried to tell them this at the ER. I'm just clumsy," he tried to sound like he believed what he was saying but she obviously saw right through him.

"If you don't want to tell me the truth that's fine as long as it's not because you still think I'm a spy," she told him.

"I…" he paused, his whirling mind coming to it's final conclusion, "I don't. I believe you and I'm sorry." And he did. And he was. He'd completely misjudged Alice Cullen. "I'm sorry I hurt your arm."

"S'Ok. I have Emmett for a brother, scraped arms and knees were common in our house when we were growing up. Still are actually," she hummed loudly, "But only with Emmett now. And sometimes Rosalie. Usually at the same time…Ew!" Her face scrunched up adorably, "I did not need that image."

"What image?" Jasper asked before he could stop himself.

"An image of one of the ways they could have gotten scrapes, or rather friction burns on their knees at the same time as each other," Alice shuddered and Jasper found himself chuckling quietly, "It's ok for you. They aren't your family."

"That must be weird. I mean…it's sort of like incest," he pointed out.

"Not really. We're adopted. We aren't related by blood or anything," Alice argued as if she had many times before which thinking about it she probably had. "So." That was all she said.

"So?" Jasper asked.

"So now that we've got that all sorted out do you want to be friends?"

"You still want to be my friend after I completely misjudged you and embarrassed you, and myself, in front the whole class?" Jasper asked, confused.

"Yeah."

"Really?"

"Really, really." She smiled, "You just need to learn not to judge a book by it's cover. Or a person. So? Friends?"

"Ok."

"Great!" Alice hugged him tightly, "And now we have to rush as we are incredibly late for first period."

"You're fault," Jasper muttered.

"Well…yes. But as the gentleman you'll take the blame."

"I will?"

"You will."

A/N I was going to write more to this before posting it up but so many people have asked for more that I felt guilty. See I'm going to my mums tomorrow and she doesn't have an internet connection so this will have to do for a little while. Hopefully only a week or so. And those of you who are worried they've patched things up too quickly just wait and see what I have in store…


	9. Chapter 9

Disclaimer: I don't own Twilight or the characters in it. They belong entirely to Stephanie. I'm just borrowing them for a little while.

A/N All human in this story.

Warning: Child Abuse.

Rescue Me

Chapter Nine.

"I'm confused," Bella admitted as she, Edward and Rosalie moved around the salad bar, filling their bowls with the vegetables they wanted to have for lunch that day. Emmett was the only one of their group in the other queue, choosing to risk a veggie burger. None of the others could stand the disgusting things, normal ones at home yes, but school veggie burgers? No.

"What about?" Edward asked, grabbing Bella's plate quickly as she almost knocked it off reaching in for some more cucumber. Like always.

"This whole thing with Alice and Jasper Whitlock," Bella explained. By some eerie coincidence just as she said their names they entered the cafeteria by the other door, the one that led in from outside. Alice was chatting happily with Jasper, looking like they had been friends for years, "I mean thought he was really horrible to her and insulted her and that we all hated him. Did I miss something?"

"No that's all true but Alice is a firm believer in forgive and forget. And over the weekend Carlisle did something he shouldn't have…" Edward was interrupted by a worried gasp from his girlfriend,

"What did Carlisle do?" A thousand and one options for what Carlisle could have do to Jasper Whitlock flittered through her mind, each of them worst than the last. But surely Carlisle wouldn't…

"He told Alice something that should have remained confidential," Edward explained, Bella's mouth dropping open in a silent 'oh', "And her determination to sort the mess out increased, a lot. Alice was a…nightmare."

"What did…?"

"I don't know. He wouldn't tell us and he made Alice promise not to tell us," Edward explained. Bella frowned worriedly, looking over at Alice and Jasper who had joined the other queue right at the back. For Jasper's meal obviously, not Alice's, "But apparently it was something that happened which caused the misunderstanding which then made Jasper freak out like he did with Alice."

"Oh," Bella's brain processed the rather rushed and confusing explanation slowly, "And so Alice…"

"Fixed things, for lack of a better word," Edward smiled at Bella as they made their way to the Cullen table, right at the edge of the cafeteria next to some of the many windows. Rosalie followed them, looking a little bit peeved.

"Something up?" Bella asked, all innocence.

"Yes. I don't think we should have forgiven him," Rosalie grumbled, shooting at glare at Jaspers back, "I haven't forgiven him."

"But…"

"It might have been a _(I)misunderstanding(I),_ " the way Rosalie said it made it clear she didn't even believe in that part of what had happened, "but the things he said were completely out of order. The school is still talking about it now and one of the most popular stories, which I overheard at cheerleading practice on Friday, is that Carlisle is apparently a violent paedophile and we're his victims and are all too afraid to speak out but Jasper is not."

"What?" Both Bella and Edward reacted in shock.

"I haven't heard that," Edward protested, "Surely not…"

"Yes, that was the story I heard and that is why I refuse to forgive him until he really earns it. And he can start by saying something that will stop that rumour before it goes too far and we get taken away from our home," Rosalie growled. None of her siblings knew the full truth of her background; that she'd been taken away from her parents because her dad had been caught with kiddie porn on his computer and her mum had deemed an unfit parent.

"Rose that won't happen," Edward protested.

"It will if that rumour gets heard by the wrong people!" Rose snapped at him.

"Oh look, Alice is bringing him over," Bella pointed out, stopping the argument before it could get louder, "She must have asked him to eat with us."

"Not with me he's not," Rosalie snapped, standing up just as the couple reached the table, Jasper looking down at his food nervously.

"Guys this is-" Alice began cheerfully but Rosalie interrupted her,

"I'm going to eat with my friends."

She turned her back on them all and walked quickly over to the over-crowded cheerleading table. Alice blinked after her with confusion written all over he little face. Jasper bit his lip hard,

"She doesn't like me," he muttered.

"Rose doesn't like anyone," Edward said quickly, "Hi Jasper, I'm Edward."

"Hi," Jasper looked anywhere but at the other people at the table, still standing even though the still shocked Alice had sat in her usual seat, "Um…so Alice…um… explained that-that I got the wrong impression and-and I'm sorry for saying what I did about your…er…family."

"That's ok, as long as it's all sorted," Edward smiled warmly up at the blond boy, "Sit down, you're making the place look untidy." Jasper sat slowly beside Alice just as the ever-cheerful Emmett bounded up to the table, sitting on Alice's other side between her and Edward.

"Hey everyone, hello there Jasper. Where's my Rose?" he asked, picking his burger up, ready to take a bit of the fowl looking thing.

"Eating with her cheerleaders," Bella answered.

"Oh, ok," he turned to say something to Alice, probable something rude, but caught sight of her injured arm, "What happened to your arm?" Startled Alice looked down at the scrapes and grazes, trying to think of a way to put it that wouldn't start another argument but Jasper spoke up first,

"I'm sorry, that was me."

"You?" Emmett thundered angrily.

"Yeah. I have a quick temper and sometimes I um I act without thinking," Jasper admitted, sounding thoroughly ashamed of himself, "I pushed your sister out of the way earlier but unfortunately I forgot there was a wall…"

"It was an accident, when I was trying to explain everything. Jasper still thought I was evil then," Alice defended him and Jasper looked at her sharply, "It's ok Emmett. Hardly hurts."

"Tink…?" Emmett had a pet name for everyone and Alice's was most definitely because of her tiny stature. "Are you sure?"

"Yes," Alice said firmly, "So we can forget all about it and talk about stupid things. Like…did anyone see Mr Green's new haircut?"

"Yes!" Bella giggled.

"Did you think he looked like a skunk too?" Alice asked,

"Yeah," Bella giggled again and the tense atmosphere was broken, the idiotic conversation continuing and going on many complete tangents. Jasper didn't say anything as he picked at his meal but as Bella was watching him she could see he was listening to every single word. She also noticed how he got tense every time Emmett spoke to him, like he was intimidated by the larger teen. Why that would be she couldn't fathom, anyone who knew him even a tiny bit knew he was a cuddly teddy bear with a huge heart.

"So Jasper, you going to the prom?" Emmett asked when the subject came up, started by Alice talking about her search for the perfect dress of course. Bella as ever was a little unwilling to talk about dresses, she hated dresses with a passion. Dresses were an evil creation designed to torture her.

"Er…wasn't planning to," Jasper answered awkwardly.

"Well you are now," Alice said calmly.

"Huh?" Jasper asked her.

"We can go together," she explained brightly.

"Oh," Jasper looked frozen to the spot and Bella frowned. Most of the single guys of the school would like to take Alice to the prom, many had asked her in fact. And yet Jasper seemed reluctant. "I haven't got a ticket," he said eventually.

"It's not too late," Alice pointed out, "You can still get them."

"I mean…I can't…afford a…ticket," his voice trailed off as he flushed with the embarrassment of it all. The Cullens and Bella looked at each other awkwardly, they really should have guessed it would be something like that. I mean his clothes were old and rather out of style…and worn.

"Oh," Alice bit her lip thoughtfully, "Well I-I could get you…"

"No," Jasper said quickly.

"Ok," Alice mumbled.

"Sorry," Jasper apologised, looking away from the table, "Maybe it's best I…er…go now…er…thanks for forgiving me and er…letting me sit with you…" He smiled shyly at them and before they could protest he was gone, emptying his tray on his way out of the cafeteria. Alice sighed,

"And it was going so well."

A/N There we go, another chapter. Now a quick thank you to all my reviewers, d'you know I get the funny feeling you like this story. Lol. Oh and to the person who pointed out that Carlisle telling Alice about Jasper was technically illegal (sorry I forgot your pen name) did you see what I did there? Did you? Oh, maybe it too subtle. Whoops. I'm rambling. But then it is really late. Should probably go to bed now. Yeah. Well, tell me what you think and any suggestions are as always welcome. Bye!


	10. Chapter 10

Disclaimer: I don't own Twilight or the characters in it. They belong entirely to Stephanie. I'm just borrowing them for a little while.

A/N All human in this story.

Warning: Child Abuse.

Rescue MeChapter Ten.

"Coffee for you Dr Cullen," Nurse Smith said brightly as she slipped into his tidy office, placing the steaming cup down on the coaster Alice had give him for his birthday the year before. It was white and said in thick, colourful letters - 'The older you get, the better you get…unless you're a banana.' (A/N This is a real coaster that I gave my mother lol.)

"Thank you Jackie," Carlisle smiled tensely up at the thoughtful nurse.

"Is something wrong?" she asked with a worried frown.

"No. I'm just waiting until a suitable time to ring someone about a follow up appointment," Carlisle answered, "And time seems to be going slower than usual." It really did seem to be going slower as he worried about Jasper. He hoped this time when he called he would be able to arrange the necessary appointment, he was worried about the poor boys hand not to mention any other injuries he hadn't told him about. He also hoped Alice would have been able to reassure the boy that there had been no conspiracy, that they were genuinely worried about him.

"It always does when you're waiting for something," the nurse smiled at him before leaving his office, shutting the door gently behind her. He took a sip of his coffee, smiling at the familiar taste. It was just how he liked it, not too strong, just enough milk and just enough sugar.

Watching the clock tick by he flicked through the file he'd printed off for Charlie Swan, finding the same excuses over and over like he had every other time head the horrifyingly long file. It seemed that Jasper recycled excuses each time he moved but for some reason no one before him had noticed, or if they had noticed they hadn't cared enough to do anything about it. If the first was the truth there were too many unobservant people in his profession. And if the second was the truth…well just the thought that someone, especially a doctor, could ignore a child in pain made Carlisle feel sick to his stomach.

It seemed like an age until Carlisle was satisfied he had given Jasper enough time to get home from school, picked up the phone and pressed the buttons in the sequence that was Jasper Whitlock's home phone number. It rang three times before it was picked up on the other end.

"Hello?" Jasper's voice asked him down the line.

"Hello Jasper, it's Dr Cullen from Forks Hospital," Carlisle said, making his voice as cheerful and warm as possible. "I'm calling to schedule your follow up appointment, we didn't set a date or time last time I called.

"Oh. Um, about that…" Jasper mumbled.

"Don't worry about it. I trust you understand now though that I would never do something like that, getting my children involved," Carlisle said, still warmly.

"Um yeah…but there's nothing for them to get involved in you know. I'm just accident prone," Jasper mumbled and Carlisle sighed. He couldn't help the boy until he admitted that something was happening to him at home, "So, this appointment…"

"When would you be able to come in and let me have a look at your wrist?" Carlisle asked, leaving the subject of his suspicions as Jasper had obviously wanted him too, "The appointment shouldn't take too long."

"I'm free any time I'm not at school," Jasper answered quietly.

"Well then when would you like to come in?" Carlisle asked.

"Um…" Jasper mumbled with uncertainty, "Well I could-"

"Who are you talking to?" the voice came from the other end of the line and Carlisle froze as he realised that it was the man responsible for Jasper's years of injuries. His father.

"It's just the Doctor," Jasper explained nervously, "About my wrist…"

"Give me the phone!" his dad demanded.

"Dad he just wants to see my wrist again and-" SMACK! "Ow!"

"I said give me the phone!" Sounds of movement filled Carlisle's ear for a few moments before Mr Whitlock's voice came back, louder than before and slurred with drink, "Stay the fuck away from my son you sack of shit or I'll tell the police about you and your-your disgusting infatuation with him, you pervert!"

"I am not a pervert Mr Whitlock," Carlisle said, his voice strong as his usually soft feature hardened with anger and revulsion. This man should not be allowed to care for any child, especially not one as nice as Jasper was, "I am a Doctor and I am concerned about your son's well being-"

"Look just fuck off and leave us alone!" Jasper's dad screamed before slamming the phone down with enough force to make Carlisle wince, the loud bang making his ear hurt. A feeling of dread filled his stomach as he worried about what was happening to Jasper now. If he was hurt tonight…well it would be Carlisle's fault wouldn't it?

For the rest of his shift which ran on well after midnight Carlisle worried about what trouble he had caused Jasper with his phone call. He was heading through the A+E towards his office, ready to pack up and go home when the doors opened and a familiar figure walked in nervously.

"Jasper?" Carlisle asked with a worried frown.

"Dr Cullen," the teenager spoke softly, "I couldn't call you back so I thought I'd come in and see you, um, about the appointment about my hand." Jasper was studying his shoes.

"Are you alright Jasper?" Carlisle asked, "I didn't cause trouble for you at home did I? Your father was quite…upset." Slowly the boy looked up and Carlisle was saddened to see the beginnings of a terrible bruise around his eye. "Did he…?"

"No," Jasper said quickly, "No he didn't."

"I heard a slap," Carlisle said softly.

"He slapped my hand out of the way, that's all," Jasper explained.

"Then how did you get that bruise?" Carlisle asked, reaching out to touch the very edge of the bruise with his pale fingers. He'd always been pale, never catching the sun even before he and his wife had moved to the wettest place in the world, also known as Forks.

"Someone accidentally elbowed me at school." The alarm bells went off loudly in Carlisle's head as he heard the lie. The bruise was too fresh to have been from an incident at the school. The bruise was his fault.

"Oh," he mumbled, "Does your father often get drunk like that?"

"No." Yet another obvious lie. "Look I came to see when you wanted me to come in and see my hand again…"

"I could take a look now if you want," Carlisle said, "Save you coming in another time. It won't take long. I just need an x-ray taking and I wouldn't mind checking that bruise of yours."

"It's nothing," Jasper said quickly, "And alright, you can look at my hand now. As long as it won't take too long. I need to get home."

"It won't take too long," Carlisle promised, "Come on. Jackie? I'll need your help for a little bit. Could you take Mr Whitlock down to the X-Ray room and have a picture or two taken of his wrist while I set up my examination room."

"Of course Dr Cullen, come on then dear."

A/N Sorry this took a while but some of you might have noticed I've been unable to stop writing my Twilight/Harry Potter story. Next chapter of this coming soon.


	11. Chapter 11

Disclaimer: I don't own Twilight or the characters in it. They belong entirely to Stephanie. I'm just borrowing them for a little while.

A/N All human in this story.

Warning: Child Abuse.

Rescue Me

Chapter Eleven.

Working as a nurse in the ER Jackie Smith had seen many things, ranging from broken collarbones to a tent peg through the foot. But never before had she seen someone with so many broken bones in one hand until this poor boy. Not only were the little bones of his hand broken but the bones of his wrist too. It was dreadful and couldn't possibly have been an accident. She and her friend Michaela had been the ones to help with the original x-ray a week or so ago and hoped that the one they had just taken would show that it was healing at the rate expected by Dr Cullen. The poor boy didn't make a sound throughout the whole event even though it must be painful for him, not to mention that nasty black eye…

"Would you like me to fetch something cold to put on that bruise?" she asked gently, causing him to jump and stare up at her with startled eyes, "It looks ever so sore, something cold would help that and ease the pain."

"That…that would be nice," he said quietly and she sent a silent prayer of thanks to whoever was listening. The last time she had seen him he would accept no kindness or help except for the cast on his hand. This was the first step that would only lead to many more and that was what the boy needed. Jackie was determined to help this poor boy in any way she could, "Thank you."

She left him briefly to wet one of the little white towels they used to clean wounds off with. Returning she tilted his head up with a gentle hand to his chin and very carefully pressed the damp towel on the bruised eye. He winced, taking over holding the towel onto his eye and Jackie reacted instinctively like she would with her own children, smoothing his hair back from his forehead with her gentle hand and stroking the soft skin of his cheek.

"There we go, that'll feel better in no time," she told him softly, smiling at him as she continued to stroke his hair back calmingly. Tears sprang to his eyes and for a moment Jackie worried that she had hurt him in some was. But it wasn't pain she saw in his eyes when she met them with her own, it was longing. He wanted someone to be kind to him, to stroke his hair and treat him gently. He wanted to feel that someone cared, that someone felt compassion for him. Jackie's heart went out to the poor boy who, judging by his reactions, hadn't had much love in his life.

"Thank you," he said quietly before pulling away from her. She let her arms drop to her sides and smiled down at him, picking up the x-ray sheet the technician had left on the table for her.

"Let's get back to Dr Cullen shall we, so he can have a look," she said cheerfully, walking over to the door and letting him follow her a few paces back. She chatted about everything and nothing on the way through the little hospital to Dr Cullens office and wasn't surprised when he chose to stay quiet. When they entered the office Dr Cullen looked up from his computed, taking the brown envelope holding the x-ray from Jackie and motioning for Jasper to take a seat.

"The wrist is healing nicely but the bones in your hand and fingers are still in the same state. Have you been resting it?" Dr Cullen asked the poor boy after spending a moment looking at the x-rays, comparing the old with the new.

"No," the poor boy, Jackie told herself she really must learn his name, mumbled, looking down at his lap still holding the damp towel to his bruised eye, "I haven't had the time."

"Jasper," Dr Cullen scolded gently, putting the x-rays down, resting his elbows on his desk and interlacing his fingers, "It needs to be rested for it to heal." As Jasper continued to avoid the doctor's kind gaze Jackie thought to herself what a nice name Jasper was.

"I know," Jasper mumbled, "I do know but I just don't have time," Jasper sighed sadly, biting his lip, "Sorry."

"It's ok. But you're going to have to make time. Now I decided against it last time but I think that it will help remind you to rest it…"

"What?" Jasper asked, finally looking up as the doctor trailed off.

"I'm going to put you're arm in a sling."

"What? No. I need to be able to move my arm. I have lots to do and…" Jasper said quickly, shaking his head from side to side. The hand holding the damp towel lowered to his lap and the swollen bruise was displayed once more.

"You'll do more damage to yourself if you don't rest it," Dr Cullen argued his point calmly. Jackie couldn't help but admire the handsome doctor's ability to stay calm no matter what happened. From his draw he produced a padded sling with a Velcro strap. Getting up he walked around the desk and fitted the sling on Jasper, moving his bad arm gently and tightening the sling three times before he decided it was at the right length. "Keep this on for the next two weeks at least."

"Ok," Jasper mumbled, putting the towel back on his eye.

"Now lets have a look at that eye," Dr Cullen ordered, moving around the face Jasper in front of his desk. He caught hold of the boys chin when Jasper tried to turn away. Jackie moved forwards quickly and took the wet towel from Jasper.

"It's fine," Jasper claimed, gasping as Dr Cullen's long fingers pressed against the bruise gently, "It's just a bruise. It'll settle down in a day or so." Dr Cullen looked thoughtful as he examined the injury carefully.

"You're right this time, it is only a bruise with a little swelling. But you could easily have had a cracked cheekbone or worse," Dr Cullen finally said, backing up to perch on the front of his desk. Jackie gave the towel back to Jasper as he said,

"No, I'd have known if it had been that. I've cracked a cheekbone before. Broken one too…playing sports," the last bit had been added on quickly when Jasper had noticed the frown Dr Cullen was now wearing. Jackie frowned at the doctor of Jaspers head, silently asking the doctor to push farther, the get the poor boy to admit that it hadn't been an accident, to ask for help…but Dr Cullen didn't.

"Well that's all Jasper, if you have any problems at all you know you can call me or come in and see me," Dr Cullen said gently instead.

"Yeah, ok," Jasper nodded, rising out of the chair, "Thanks." He turned to go but paused in front of Jackie, holding out the towel to her, "Thank you."

"Your welcome," she smiled at him, taking the towel whilst brushing his hair back with her other hand, "Take care of yourself, no more…accidents."

"I'll…try," he said, giving her a sad little smile. And then he was gone. Jackie turned to Dr Cullen, frowning at him.

"Why didn't you press him to tell you the truth?" she asked.

"Because he'd have run. He needs to come to us in his own time. Until then we must remind him that he has someone and somewhere to turn to for help. We must show him that we want to help him. We must help him to trust us," Dr Cullen said sadly, the case was hurting him badly. "We must wait."

"And hope that nothing worse happens to him."

Dr Cullen could say nothing to that.

A/N There we go, another chapter for you lot to read. Next chapter is another Alice chapter.


	12. Chapter 12

Disclaimer: I don't own Twilight or the characters in it. They belong entirely to Stephanie. I'm just borrowing them for a little while.

A/N All human in this story.

Warning: Child Abuse.

Rescue MeChapter Twelve.

Alice felt really, really bad as she thought back to how Jasper had reacted the day before during lunch. He'd been right to react the way he did and she was such an idiot! How could she be so senseless? To talk of money like it was nothing to him of all people, she was a wretched person, a wretched uncaring brainless person.

"What's up?" Esme asked as she sat on the edge of her littlest daughter's bed.

"Nothing," Alice sighed, looking away from the dress she had been staring at as it hung on the outside of her wardrobe. It was her prom dress, still wrapped in the protective layer of plastic the shop had put it in to keep it looking new.

"Alice," Esme said softly, "What is it baby?" Alice sighed heavily and moved sideways, laying down so that her head was in Esme's lap. Immediately her mother's fingers began to move soothingly through her short hair. "Alice?"

"I was stupid," Alice mumbled, "I didn't mean to be. We were talking about the prom and I forgot that Jasper might not…well that he might not have the money to buy a ticket." Alice wiped at her eyes. "And then I put my foot in it big time by offering to buy him one myself! Like I was some charity or something! Oh I'm such an idiot! And it was going so well."

"I'm sure he knows you weren't being charitable on purpose," Esme said softly, "You just didn't engage brain when you were being nice. He'll know that."

"But he looked so hurt. I hurt him," Alice mumbled sadly.

"Then you need to talk to him, explain and make things better," Esme said softly, "You need to get up, get dressed and get to school and talk to him. I'll make you a nice cup of tea and some toast while you get dressed. Although you must hurry or you'll make your siblings late."

"Sorry."

Alice jumped out of the car almost before it had stopped and searched the crowds of school children heading into the school for Jasper's familiar face. When she found it she ran full pelt up to him and only just managed to stop before she went careering into him. She gasped at the sight of a terrible black eye, she wanted to kiss it better for him, to take him in her arms and press her lips gently to the bruised skin…what on earth was she thinking? This was not a time for thoughts like that, it was a time for heartfelt apologies.

"I'm sorry," she said breathlessly, "I'm sorry for being uncaring yesterday and for embarrassing you about the prom and forgetting that you might not have…and…and for offering to give you a ticket. I wasn't being charitable or snobby, I just wanted to go with you and I'm sorry. Sorry."

"It's all right," Jasper said softly, "I-I understand."

"I didn't mean anything by what I said," Alice continued.

"I know," he reached out and touched her bare arms gently, his fingertips stroking over the healing grazes on her arms. Carlisle had given her a cream to help them heal and it had really helped. Alice trembled at his touch. Oh he was…was…

"I'm still sorry…" she breathed before she could stop herself.

"And I still know," he smiled softly down at her.

"Oh…good," she mumbled, looking at the thumb still stroking her skin gently, "You know we seem to be making a habit of this."

"I know," he replied to her mutter, "But it's not a good habit. One to break."

"Like smoking," Alice said brightly. He frowned slightly before nodding with a little laugh escaping his lips,

"Like smoking."

"So…friends still?" Alice asked.

"Of course," Jasper smiled and her heart beat all the faster. Could he be any sexier…well maybe he will be, a little voice said in the back of her mind, in a tux that was snug about his body…especially his bottom.

'Shut up!' she silently scalded that little voice as her cheeks flushed red.

"Are you all right?" Jasper asked, sounding concerned.

"Yes, I'm fine now," Alice nodded, "What about you? How did you hurt your eye? It looks quite nasty…"

"I got elbowed in games," Jasper answered softly.

"Hmm," Alice did not believe that in the slightest. "So…school?" she asked, being as bright as she could as the bell rang. He looked thankful that she wasn't pressing further but little did he know that she was not going to give up on this or on him. He needed help and she would be there when he finally asked. That she silently promised him, she would be there when he needed her.

"School," Jasper nodded and the pair headed into school. All of a sudden a brilliant idea popped into her head and she paused in her step, taking his good hand in hers and pulling him to a stop as well.

"Jasper, do you want to hang out this weekend?" she asked before her nerves could get the better of her. She hadn't specifically said it was a date, after all it was usually the boy asking a girl on a date but if it was just the two of them, well hopefully he would get the hint. His eyes widened briefly. "We could catch a movie or grab a meal or go shopping."

"I…" he mumbled.

"Please? So that I can really say sorry for everything that's happened and before you say anything I wouldn't pay for your stuff," Alice said sternly, earning a light laugh from Jasper.

"Ok. We can hang out. Cheapest thing possible though," Jasper said softly.

"Shopping!"

"How is shopping the cheapest?" Jasper asked confused as they began moving towards the school once again, Alice still holding his hand in hers.

"Because I'll be the one spending all the money! You'll just have to carry all my things," she giggled rather flirtatiously and earned a smile from him.

"So basically you want someone to carry your bags?" he asked.

"No! Well maybe a little," she teased him cheerfully.

"I'd love to," he smiled genuinely at her.

"Great! I'll pick you up on Saturday morning. Nine ok?" Alice asked eagerly.

"Nines fine," he agreed, "Do you have a car?"

"Uh-huh, Carlisle and Esme gave it to me for my sixteenth birthday. Family tradition," Alice said quickly.

"Oh," Jasper mumbled, "What-What car is it?"

"A 911 Turbo Porche," Alice said quickly.

"You have a porche!" he gasped in shock.

"Guilty," Alice giggled.

"Bloody hell…"

"Language!"

A/N Finally, an update and a date to come! Yay!


	13. Chapter 13

Disclaimer: I don't own Twilight or the characters in it. They belong entirely to Stephanie. I'm just borrowing them for a little while.

A/N All human in this story.

Warning: Child Abuse.

Rescue Me

Chapter Thirteen.

Jasper got up ridiculously early on Saturday morning, hurrying to do the things he'd usually have spent all day long doing. He picked up all the empties scattered about the house and put them in the recycling bin. He emptied and re-filled the dishwasher, emptied and re-filled the washing machine, put the wet clothes from the washing machine into the tumble drier and made a list of things he needed to get from the supermarket later on. His usual Saturday squeezed into an hour and a bit.

Chores done he checked on his dad finding him still zonked out from the drinking the night before. He'd be pissed when he found Jasper gone when he woke up but for a sort of date with Alice that was a sacrifice he would willingly make. He'd chosen his nicest t-shirt; a short sleeved green one for once showing off his cast in all its chunky entirety. It was the only t-shirt he had that wasn't permanently stained or damaged in some other way. With this went that same old jeans he always wore and his faded black denim jacket that in places was almost grey.

The door bell buzzed pathetically, on it's way out of this world and he grabbed his wallet (the only money in it the weekly housekeeping money) and his keys as he rushed to answer it, still trying to be as quiet as possible. He tried to stop his jaw dropping at the sight of her. She looked…well amazing didn't cover it. Today she was simply…beautiful. Her hair was spiked out as ever but a thick hair band with a large red bow on it separated her fringe from the rest of her hair. Her dress had a tight bodice and flared madly at the waist giving it a fifties look. It was white but pattered with red dots of various sizes. On anyone else he suspected it would have been too much but on her it was just…beautiful. The cut of the dress also accented her teeny tiny waist and her pretty little brea-

"Hi," her sweet voice snapped his gaze up from her chest.

"Sorry," he blushed at having been caught staring.

"It's ok," she giggled and her suspected that she was secretly pleased. "So do you like my dress? It's the test run, never worn it out before."

"It's lovely," he breathed, "But won't you get cold?" The dress only had tiny little sleeves and her pale arms were bare to the cold air. She brought her hands round from behind her back and he noticed she was carrying a white cardigan. "Oh, ok. But that's still really thin…"

"I'll be fine," she smiled up at him, "Rushing round the shops always keeps me more than warm. Not that we'll be rushing too much. Just a little." She was moving from side to side in excitement and Jasper noticed that she was wearing black and red heels, really high black and red heels.

"You drive in those?" he asked with a frown.

"No," she laughed, shaking her head, "I like driving in bare feet."

"Ok," Jasper said slowly.

"I know it's weird," Alice blushed in embarrassment.

"No. Not weird," he shook his head. "Shall we?" he asked as he stepped out of his house, quietly shutting the front door behind him.

"Yes!" Alice cried happily, linking arms with him and dragging him to the pavement where her stunning yellow car was parked. Once again he was stunned, the car was just so…God how could a car turn him on? No wait, it wasn't the car, it was the sight of Alice waiting in the car for him, her big eyes blinking up at him expectantly… "Are you coming? Or do you want a few more minutes to drool over my car?" she asked with a giggle.

"Not just the car," he reassured her before he could stop himself.

"Oh," she blushed with pleasure as he blushed with embarrassment, "Thanks."

"Welcome," Jasper coughed awkwardly as he climbed into the passenger seat. He admired both the car and it's driver as they zoomed along the roads towards Port Angeles. Alice chose the music of course and he found himself pleasantly surprised at the CD she chose, one of his favourites. "You like the Scissor Sisters?"

"Duh," she laughed loudly, "They're great!"

"I think so too," he said and she beamed at him.

She parked the car in the multi-storey car park and everyone on their floor stared at them in awe as they climbed out, gracefully in her case, not so gracefully in his. Once again she slipped her arms through his and led the way to the Mall, a journey she obviously knew like the back of her own hand.

Jasper was surprised how much he genuinely enjoyed the experience that was shopping with Alice. She dragged him into all the vintage shops as well as the designer shops and within an hour was carrying four large bags for her and she was carrying one of her own. They stopped for lunch and Jasper ordered only a coffee. She wouldn't hear of that though and shared her salad with him, claiming it was far too big for her to eat on her own. He knew she was lying but…well mostly he didn't want to hurt her feeling by refusing. He wouldn't let her pay for his coffee though, that he was adamant over, using a tiny bit of the housekeeping money instead.

"Now for you," Alice said happily as they returned to the shopping, heading into a mens shop this time.

"Alice…" Jasper mumbled, he didn't have money to spend on clothes, certainly not the expensive ones from this shop.

"Shh, I'm not insisiting you buy something. I just want to see you in something fashionable and nice. I think you'll look dead sexy," she said reassuringly to him. Moving about quickly she filled the cloth basket and went with him into the changing room much to his embarrassment. She sat on the little seat with all her bags at her feet and waited as he reluctantly changed.

She'd chosen a white shirt that was slightly too big so it would easily go over his cast, a matching jacket and trousers of the softest and blackest material he'd ever felt. He couldn't tie the tie she'd chosen, one of a deep blue and he couldn't tie the laces of the shoes. Biting his lip he stepped out and her eyes went wide.

"Holy poo on toast," she breathed, "Have you seen yourself?" she asked as she stood, easily tying the tie in a perfect knot. The shoes didn't matter so much. He shook his head; he'd refused to look at himself as he changed. He wasn't built for fancy clothes like these. "Look in the mirror," she ordered, turning his to face the large mirror at the end of the cubicles.

"Alice…"

"Look." So he did and his own eyes widened. He…he didn't look like himself. He looked like a smart young man from a good family, standing next to the most beautiful girl in the world. And they looked…good together.

"Oh," he mumbled.

"Please, if you decide to come to the prom anyway…wear something like this," she breathed in his ear.

"I couldn't afford this…" he said softly.

"Don't care at this moment in time. You look like a God," she told him calmly. He turned his head to look at her, frowning. "You do. Don't deny it."

"I look…different," he admitted.

"Yes. Like…a…God," Alice said slowly.

"Can I get out of this now?" he asked softly.

"No," Alice shook her head, "I need to memorise every detail."

"Alice," he muttered in embarrassment.

"Take a picture love, it'll last longer," the cloakroom attendant advised. Alice turned to him and grinned, pulling out her mobile phone.

"Oh no! No! No! No!" Jasper shook his head, making to hide in the cubicle again. Alice grabbed his good wrist and held him still. "Alice…"

"Smile," she ordered. He had no choice but to obey as she snapped several pictures with her phone's camera. "There, now you can get changed and hand me out the clothes. I'll return them whilst your putting your own stuff back on."

He hurried to obey, listening to her as she clicked her way back into the store as he struggled to do up his jeans. That had been slightly humiliating and very…annoying. Oh he wished he had the money to buy a prom ticket and a suit like that so that he could take that gorgeous girl to the prom…wasn't reality a bitch?

When he stepped out of the cubicle she was re-arranging something in one of her many bags, the one that she was carrying in fact and smiled excitedly at him. They moved onto the next store and the next and Jasper found himself trying on numerous outfits just so that Alice could see him wearing them. He lost count of how much she bought and not just for herself, things her sister had asked her to pick up and a couple of DVD's Emmett had asked her to grab while she was in town.

He tried not to feel jealous at the way she so casually spent her money.

The drive home was a bit more cramped than the journey out thanks to all the bags wedged around them, they wouldn't all fit in the boot. They talked and when Alice asked him if he'd enjoyed himself he found himself asking honestly that, yes, he had thoroughly enjoyed his time with her.

"So…shall we hang out again together?" she asked hopefully.

"Would you like to go to the cinema?" he asked in answer to her question, "On a…on a…" Go on Jasper, he silently willed himself, seize the moment, "On a date? With me?"

"A date?" she asked softly.

"Yeah. If you want…that is," he mumbled.

"I'd love to!" she beamed across the car at him.

"Great," he said softly, "Um, do you think you could drop me off at the supermarket? I need to do the food shop?"

"Sure but…how will you get home?" Alice asked.

"I'll walk. I normally do," Jasper shrugged.

"With all the shopping bags?" Alice asked with a frown.

"Yeah," Jasper looked away, "It's not that bad. There's only me and my dad so there's not too much to carry." He failed to mention the fact that with the amount of money his dad wasted on drink they couldn't afford that much. His dad's army pension, earned from a medical discharge after suffering a mental breakdown at the death of his mother, didn't stretch that far each month. Jasper was seriously considering getting an after school/weekend job on top of doing all the housework.

"Ok," Alice said reluctantly. "Why don't you drive?"

"Never learnt how," Jasper answered truthfully.

"I could teach you," Alice offered.

"It's ok. I like walking," Jasper said softly.

"Oh, ok," Alice smiled at him. She pulled up by the entrance to the supermarket in the loading bay, annoying someone also heading for that spot. She didn't take any notice. "I really enjoyed our hanging out today."

"So did. And…um…we'll arrange the er…the date later," he mumbled.

"Yeah. I'll look forward to it," she smiled at him. He tumbled out of the car, pushing the bags back in before slamming the door shut with what he reflected afterwards was probably a little too much force. "See you Monday!"

"See you!" he replied and watched as she sped away in the stunning car. Then, sighing deeply he grabbed a trolley and headed inside the busy supermarket, pulling out his list as he began his way down the first aisle.

A/N Wow, wrote this in one go the night before I went to France. Sadly because of said trip to France this then had to wait almost a full week to be put up. Hope you guys think it was worth the wait.


	14. Chapter 14

Disclaimer: I don't own Twilight or the characters in it. They belong entirely to Stephanie. I'm just borrowing them for a little while.

A/N All human in this story.

Warning: Child Abuse.

Rescue Me

Chapter Fourteen.

"Rosie, posy, pudding and pie. Wouldn't kiss Emmett and made him cry. What will Emmett have to say, to get a kiss to come his way?" Emmett sang loudly to the tune of 'Georgie Porgy' as he entered her bedroom without knocking.

"Well you can start by going out again and knocking," she said, barely glancing up at him from her gossip magazine.

"Oh," Emmett mumbled, "Sorry Rosie…"

She smiled to herself as he quietly left the room. He'd gotten into the bad habit of simply opening the door to her room without warning and a couple of times she'd been changing. Part of her hadn't minded him seeing her in her lacy underwear, after all he was her boyfriend and even though they hadn't gone further than making out (despite the rumours) it was the next logical step in their relationship…

But no, not yet and certainly not with their shared adoptive parents in the same house. No, no and no. Ew, in fact. No she'd imagined their first time, planned it perfectly in fact. They'd be on a picnic in the woods, the sun would be setting, they'd light candles and then when everything around them was perfect…

_Knock! Knock!_

"Come in!" she called out, pressing her hands to her red cheeks quickly. By the time he was back in her room and looking at her she was the perfect image of composure. She watched him as he closed the door behind him, breaking their parents 'open door at all times' rule. He walked over to her slowly, stopping when he was stood right in front of her as she sat on the edge of her bed.

"Can I have a kiss, Rosie, posy?" he asked, leaning further down towards.

"Only if you tell me you love me," she said playfully to him. Emmett was the only person she allowed to see the person behind the bitchy mask, even her family got the mask most of the time. She didn't like people seeing the vulnerable side of her.

"I love you," he said it so softly that it was almost a whisper and it sent a shiver up and down her spine. Some days she didn't think she was worthy of him; he was such a nice person, a people person. And she was a bitch 98% of the time, no matter how hard she tried to stop. But the few times she had confided in him about this he had told her very simply that she was being stupid and proceeded to kiss away all her worries, hell kiss away all her thoughts entirely.

"Come here," she whispered, grabbing the front of his t-shirt as he leant down the rest of the way and pressed his soft lips to hers. It started as a soft and gentle kiss, his hands stroking her long blond curls lightly but in moved quickly into one much more passionate. His hands moved, pushing gently on her shoulders until she found herself laid down on her back with him pressing down on top of her. Not that she was going to complain, all those muscles…

"So what exactly is this for?" she asked breathlessly as their mouths disengaged briefly, their bodies needing air. Her eyes narrowed as he shifted uncomfortably above her but not for the obvious reasons, "Emmett?"

"What? Can't I kiss the most beautiful girl in the world without having a reason?" he asked, his tone definitely defensive. That set off alarm bells in her head.

"Ok, what do you want?" she asked him, knowing that he either wanted her to do something (most probably part of his homework) or had done something and was putting off telling her what.

"Nothing…" Emmett mumbled before kissing her again and this time she knew it was meant as a distraction. Not that it wasn't an enjoyable distraction but still…distraction. Pushing him away she locked her gaze with his and asked,

"What did you do?"

"Nothing," Emmett mumbled, his voice shaking slightly, "Nothing much."

"Define 'nothing much'," Rosalie ordered with a growing feeling of dread. Usually he'd caved in by now and told her that he'd put one of his socks in with the white wash and her favourite blouse was ruined or that he'd forgotten to pass on a message for her that was important. For him to be holding out this long whatever he had done must be bad.

"I might have had a slight…accident with the cars," Emmett said reluctantly.

"Whose cars?" Rosalie asked.

"Ours," Emmett said softly.

"What sort of accident?" Rosalie asked, trying to keep calm. Her car was her pride and joy, the only thing she cared about more than her car was Emmett but if he had damaged it in any way…well he was going down to second place. That car had been awful when she'd gotten it. She'd re-styled the interior, tinkered with the engine till it was a thing of beauty and turned a relatively ordinary convertible into something way cooler and much more personal.

"I was reversing and I…dinged your car with mine," he admitted softly.

"You dinged my car," she repeated in a deadly serious tone. When she pushed lightly Emmett all but flew off of her, backing away until he pressed himself against the wall. "You **dinged** my car."

"Yeah," he muttered, "It was an accident Rose and I'll repair it my self…"

"How much of a ding are we talking about? Is it a little scratch or…"

"You're missing a few lights on the right side and your front bumpers a little bent and the paintwork um will need re-doing…" he admitted reluctantly.

"Emmett McCarthy Cullen, you are so dead!" she said this slowly, her voice raising with every word and when she was done Emmett wisely rang for the door, throwing it open and running through the house. She chased after him, listing the many ways she was going to kill him. That was **not** a ding!

"What's going on?" Alice asked as she came through the front door holding a ridiculous amount of shopping bags just as Rosalie chased Emmett into the room, screaming like a banshee. In fact Alice only just stepped back in time or she'd have been trampled. The noise had brought Esme out of the kitchen and she watched in fear for the priceless antiques and Rosalie continued to try and catch the evasive Emmett.

"He reversed into the front of my car and smashed the lights on one side!" Rosalie screamed, standing still for a moment and pointing at Emmett in a most accusing way. Alice gasped.

"I've said I'm sorry Rosie and I will fix it as soon as the new parts come through," Emmett said, stopping on the other side of the catch and holding his hands up in surrender like she was pointing a gun at him instead of a finger.

"You'd better fix my car or I'll never forgive you let alone kiss you ever again!" Rosalie growled at him. Esme walked around the tall blond girl to relieve Alice of some of her bags. "How could you be so careless?"

"I was listening to the radio and chatting to Edward on the phone and…"

"You were on the phone while you were reversing!" Rosalie gasped.

"Yeah…" Emmett mumbled.

"That was very dangerous Emmett. You're lucky one of us wasn't in the garage," Esme said softly but sternly.

"Sorry Esme," he mumbled.

"Now Rosalie dear, calm down. He's said he's sorry and he'll fix it. Car's can be easily fixed and think on it this way, it gives you an excuse to tinker with it again," Esme as ever was the peace maker and Rosalie felt some of the anger drain out of her body at her mothers logical thinking.

"Truce?" Emmett asked softly.

"Truce but you are so in my bad books until my car is fixed," she growled at him before turning to look at Alice, "Did you buy the whole store again?"

"No," Alice shook her head.

"Did you have a nice date?" Esme asked.

"It wasn't a date," Alice protested, "But he did ask me out on a date."

"Oh Alice, honey I'm so pleased!" Esme gasped, awkwardly hugging her littlest child as both of their hands were filled with bags.

"Oh yeah, please that she's going on a date with the guy who's got the whole school talking about us in a bad way," Rosalie muttered. No, she hadn't warmed up to Jasper yet. Alice sighed.

"He's sorry about that you know," she said, "And he's very nice."

"Humph," Rosalie made a soft noise before turning and heading out to the garage to check on the damage that had been done, leaving Alice and Esme talking about the shopping. Emmett disappeared up to his room to hide for a little while until she'd calmed down some more.

The angry scream that came from the garage told him it could be a little while.

A/N There we go, a little bit of Rosalie and Emmett for you to keep you happy until the date chapter. R & R.


	15. Chapter 15

Disclaimer: I don't own Twilight or the characters in it. They belong entirely to Stephanie. I'm just borrowing them for a little while.

A/N All human in this story.

Warning: Child Abuse.

Rescue Me

Fifteen. 

He had asked her to go to the cinema. He'd just walked up to her in front all of her family and friends and asked her to go to the cinema with him. And even though she'd already said she would love to go on a date with him he had been scared shitless that she had changed her mind and would say no and embarrass him and…but she'd said yes. So they were going to the cinema.

"I'll drive," she'd said cheerfully, still surrounded by everyone and he silently thanked her. No one knew he couldn't drive and that would have been embarrassing to explain, "You can drool over my car again."

"I did not drool over your car," he had protested with a smile.

"You so did!" she'd laughed loudly, "He so did."

He'd laughed with her and her friends, asking them (the ones who weren't her siblings) what they would have done if they were picked up in a 911 Turbo Porche. They'd answered very truthfully. They'd have drooled.

Now the only problem was he needed to find the money for a cinema ticket but he had a plan. He did the weekly shot a day early, doing it on Friday instead of Saturday and being very careful with what he bought he managed to save ten dollars of what he was always given for the food. That ten dollars now seemed to burn in his hand here he'd tucked it in the top of his cast.

"No change at all?" his dad slurred.

"Only coins, um…" Jasper made a show of being clumsy as he pulled out the few coins there had been in the change. His dad took them and counted them.

"Foods getting expensive these days," he grumbled loudly.

"Yes, it is," Jasper said, "I did manage to get you some beers though." It had meant going without some other stuff but the beer would put his dad in a good mood. "I had just enough to get you a six pack."

"Thank you." That was the first time in years that Jasper could remember his dad thanking him and for a moment he was completely stunned.

"Is it all right if I go out tomorrow dad?" he asked softly as his dad pulled one of the beers out of the fridge, opening it and chugging half of it in one go.

"What for? You went out last week," his dad asked.

"Well see I'm having trouble with one of my classes so I've got a tutor," he lied softly, "She's going to tutor me at the weekends so I don't fail my class."

"A tutor," his dad mumbled, obviously questioning the story a little.

"Yeah. She's really smart," Jasper nodded, speaking truthfully. Alice was really smart. "You don't…mind, do you?" he asked nervously.

"No. Do it, tutor whatever," his dad shrugged, "An old friend of mine from the Army is coming to town so I'm going out for a booze up anyway. He's just gotten divorced and wants to celebrate. I told him he should never have married the bitch. Apparently she's been bonking half the base behind his back," his dad laughed.

"Ok dad," Jasper said softly, rushing upstairs. His dad was ok with him going out and he hadn't questioned the change…he'd gotten away with it! He'd never have dreamed of doing something like this before he met Alice, he'd never have risked it! But she was most definitely worth it. She was perfect… "And now she won't have to pay for me tomorrow."

His dad had gone out for his all day booze up by the time she came to pick him up in her amazing car. He locked the door behind him, slipping the key into his pocket and climbed into her car.

"Hi," she smiled at him, "You ok?"

"Yeah. You look great," he said truthfully. She was wearing a nicely tight white blouse that had a giant collar and a black skirt with white lines going horizontally across it in random places. The skirts hem was ruffled and on right side it seemed to have been pulled up a bit so that a section over her right thigh was shorter than the rest. A thick brown belt hid the place where the blouse and skirt met and around her neck was a chunky amber necklace. And, he noticed with a quiet chuckle, she was driving in bare feet and a pair of ridiculously high black heels were peeking out from under the seat.

"Thanks. It's one of the outfits I bought last week with you," she smiled happily as she began to drive with an almost effortless air about her. Jasper couldn't help but think of how perfect she was. Truly perfect. Nice. Funny. Compassionate. Beautiful. Kind. He could go on forever. "How's your hand feeling?"

"Much better," he answered truthfully, looking down at the cast.

"And you're eye looks better," she smiled across at him.

"It feels better too," Jasper was once again truthful in his answer. His dad hadn't hit him today or yesterday, not even a little slap. "So what do you fancy seeing?" he asked, trying to sound casual.

"Well I've seen the trailers for most of the films out at the moment and I like the look of all of them so how about we just choose when we get there," she suggested cheerfully.

"Ok," he smiled, fiddling with the ripped sleeve of his long sleeved top, the same one he wore on their shopping trip.

They arrived at the cinema not long after and she parked with ease, turning on her seat so that she could put her shoes on before standing up. By then he'd walked around the car to offer his hand to her in a very gentlemanly way to help her stand up.

"Thank you," she smiled at him, retrieving her purse and slamming the door shut. She pressed the button on the keys and the car did the usual 'beep-beep' signalling it was now locked. She slipped her arm through his as they crossed the car park and stood in front of the sign showing the films and what tines they were on.

"I guess we can rule Wolverine and Star Trek out, boys films and all that," he said softly as they both read the board.

"Are you kidding? They look really good!" He couldn't tell if she really meant that or if she was just being far too nice knowing he wouldn't want to see a romantic girly film like some of the others were. "I really like the look of Star Trek."

"You do?" he asked.

"Yeah and hey look! The next showing in fifteen minutes! It's fate!" she cried happily, taking his good hand and leading him inside the building. She walked them both up to the booking desk. "Two for the next showing of Star Trek please."

"Front, Middle or Back?" the guy asked, sounding like he would much rather be somewhere else. She turned to him, smiled almost impishly, made his heart beat faster and then answered with a wicked grin,

"Back please. Back row if possible."

The guy obeyed and read out the price but as Alice was reaching for her wallet Jasper had already handed over the ten dollar note he'd had in his jeans pocket since yesterday. (A/N Being British I have no idea whether ten dollars would cover two tickets but please, just go with me on this.)

"Jasper! I was going to pay!" she protested.

"You can get the snacks," he shrugged, taking his change and the two tickets from the guy who had already taken his attention off of them. She sighed unhappily before almost skipping over to the snack zone and ordering a large pepsi to share, a large bucket of sweet popcorn to share and a bag of minstrels to share. It came to more than the tickets but he tried not to notice, just grabbed the drink with the good hand while managing to hold the tickets with just the un-broken fingers of his bad hand. "This is enough to feed an army Alice."

"I'm hungry and you're too skinny. I need to fatten you up," her grin told him she was teasing him and he was relieved, he was too skinny.

"Oh really?" he asked playfully as they walked over to the person taking the tickets. "Just how fat do you plan on making me?"

"Fatter than me. That way I'll look skinnier," she laughed and he couldn't help but laugh with her. He handed over the tickets which were ripped in half as they were directed to Screen Three. A guy as bored as everyone else in the place seemed to be showed them to their seats and they settled down as the ridiculous car adverts played on the giant screen. "Why do they never make car adverts that make sense? If it's an advert for a car shouldn't it be about what a car can do? Not making a car break dance using a computer."

"I agree," Jasper said to her. So far they were the only ones in the back row and he'd let Alice have the aisle seat. He put the drink in the holder and took the popcorn from her when she motioned for him to do so, holding it on his lap with his bad hand so that his good hand was free to eat with.

"Don't forget to turn you're phone off," Alice said, pulling hers out of her purse to do just that. Jasper was not surprised that it was a very nice phone.

"Don't have one to turn off," he shrugged.

"You don't have a phone?" she asked in shock.

"No."

"I swear you live in the stone ages," she said seriously and he laughed.

"It's not all that bad," he said truthfully. "Oh, the trailers are starting," he commented as the last lights went off and the film adverts began. Harry Potter 6 looked really good and that was coming from someone who hadn't seen the other five films and had never read the books.

"We so have to go and see that," Alice whispered in his ear.

"Ok," he replied softly.

The adverts ended and the screen got even bigger as the movie started…

A/N I've split the date in two for a reason, please don't kill me.


	16. Chapter 16

Disclaimer: I don't own Twilight or the characters in it. They belong entirely to Stephanie. I'm just borrowing them for a little while.

A/N All human in this story.

Warning: Child Abuse.

Rescue Me

Chapter Sixteen.

The movie was good, rather funny in places, but as it got further and further along and the storyline got more complicated and more scary and more…everything Alice couldn't help jumping and reaching out to her side, grabbing Jasper's good hand tightly with her own.

"Are you ok?" he asked her softly.

"Yeah…it's just…" she blushed furiously, feeling stupid now but when she tried to pull her hand away he held on gently but firmly.

"It's ok," he said softly, "You can hold my hand if it makes you feel better." He said that facing the screen and so he missed the happy smile that lit up her face as she settled her hand into a much more comfortable grip.

For some reason the movie wasn't as scary after that.

"We're staying for the credits," Alice said as Jasper just tried to get up when the credits started to roll, "I want to find out who played a couple of the characters." He settled down, putting the almost empty bucket of popcorn aside with his bad hand so that he didn't have to let go of her hand. "Ok, we can go now."

"Did you enjoy it?" Jasper asked as they walked out of the dark room, still hand in hand, their fingers entwined. That he was willing to walk hand in hand with her made a warm feeling grow in her stomach.

"I did," Alice said happily, "Did you?"

"I did," he agreed.

"Who was your favourite character?" Alice asked, "Mine was Chekov, he was just so cute with his accent and his curly hair…" Distantly she realised that the boy holding her hand had an accent and curly hair.

"I'd have to say…Scotty," Jasper said, looking down at her with a beautiful smile on his face, "Because of his sense of humour." They hadn't finished the minstrels so she was carrying the little bag of chocolates in her other hand, swinging it back and forth like she was a little kid. "We should…we should do this again some time. Take in a movie, I mean."

"Sure!" Alice said brightly, smiling up at him. Oh, he looked so beautiful today with his hair all swept back. And really sexy. Jasper looked sexy with his hair swept back. "Wanna hang out for a bit or do you need to go home?"

"Well I've gotta get tea ready," Jasper said reluctantly, looking up at the clock on the wall, "Is that the time?"

"Apparently," Alice smiled brightly, silently cursing the evil clock telling them it was half past five, "I take it that means home?"

"Sorry," he said even more reluctantly this time.

"No, it's ok," Alice smiled brightly, leading the way out into the car park. "Wait." She stopped them on the opposite side to where she parked her car, aimed the keys at it and pushed the buttons.

"Alice, it's too far away," Jasper pointed out.

"How much you want to bet?" Alice asked cheekily, looking away from the car and pointing the keys at her own head. This time when she pressed the buttons they both heard the 'click, click' of her car unlocking.

"How did you do that?" Jasper asked.

"I have no idea, a friend told me about the trick," Alice giggled, pulling him along by his hand once more, "And it really does work about 80% of the time."

"Weird," Jasper chuckled.

Alice almost sighed out loud with sadness when he let go of her hand to get into the car but she controlled herself. What would he think if she got upset about a little thing like that? She hurried to join him in the car, in the driver's seat of course and in her hurry completely forgot to take her heels off until she had shut the door.

"Oh arse," she said in the most polite tone of voice that Jasper couldn't help but laughing. "It's not funny, I've got to get out again and take my shoes off. Can't take them off in here." It was one of the bad points about the amazing car she'd been given and fallen ion love with; it was a little bit cramped when it came to doing anything other than driving. All at once the image of her and Jasper doing something that was definitely not driving flashed up in her mind and her cheeks flamed red.

"Twist round," Jasper ordered softly.

"Huh?" Alice asked in surprise. She gave a little squeal when he reached over with his good arm and pulled her legs up and around so that her back was against the door and her feet were in his lap. Her skirt had also twisted and in twisted had gotten a lot…shorter.

"I can take them off for you," Jasper said softly, focusing on the small straps of the shoes. Alice's cheeks burned even redder as his gentle fingers touched her feet. Normally she'd have found someone else touching her feet incredibly gross but this was Jasper…Jasper was carefully slipping her shoes off of her feet and placing them on the floor of her car between his feet.

"T-Thank you," she breathed when he was done.

"You're welcome," he smiled softly at her as he helped her twist back round and then quickly looked away as she lifted up in her seat to pull her skirt back into the correct position.

"S-So…home," she smiled across at him before starting the car.

As she drove she tried to calm herself down, scolding herself in her head.

'Come on Alice, all he did was take you're shoes off for you! He did not try to have…relations, God I sound like Carlisle now, with you in your car; he took your shoes off so you could drive. Calm down!'

But she couldn't.

"Oh just pull over here," Jasper said quickly, ending the directions he'd been giving her, when they turned into his road. She obeyed but frowned across at him. Both times he'd had her drop her off somewhere else, first the supermarket and now at the end of the road.

"Why won't you let me drop you at you're house?" Alice asked softly.

"Because…I lied to my dad about where I was going today," he admitted with a nervous laugh, his cheeks turning almost as red as hers, "I told him I was failing a class and was meeting my tutor."

"Oh really?" she giggled.

"Yeah. He'd flip if he knew I was going on a date," Jasper chuckled.

"Carlisle knows," Alice said calmly, turning off the engine.

"What did he say?" Jasper asked and Alice immediately noticed the wary tone that had come into his sexy voice.

"He said," she blushed as she remembered exactly what Carlisle had said so clinically and seriously, "He basically said that if we have more dates and become a couple and want to…well take this further…not that I'm saying I want to or that that's what I think should happen…but he said to be careful…you know…use…um…" she mumbled, completely and thoroughly embarrassed. It actually felt like her face was burning, melting off her cheeks and dripping onto the front of her blouse. "I'm going to stop talking now."

"Good idea," Jasper mumbled, just as embarrassed.

Silence fell as they both looked out the windscreen, along the road of not so expensive houses, some with gates missing and paint chipped. Alice wondered which one was Jaspers house…

"Do you want to?" Jasper asked suddenly, "Not…not that. I meant do you want to be my…I mean will you be my girlfriend?" he asked haltingly. She turned to smile at him.

"I'd love to be your girlfriend," she answered, her stomach flipping over. He'd asked her! He'd actually asked her and now they were official and…

"Great!" he breathed out in relief.

"What? Did you think I'd say no?" Alice asked.

"Yes," he answered shortly.

"Well I didn't," Alice smiled, reaching over to take his hand again, "Does that mean you'll be my boyfriend?"

"Yes," he nodded, "I'd…I'd love to be you're boyfriend."

"Great!" Alice cried happily, her eyes lighting up and making him smile softly in return, "So…will you let me drive you to school for now on?"

"Um…" Jasper winced slightly.

"We're going out now. A girlfriend can pick her boyfriend up," Alice said cheerfully. She could not stand for him walking all that way every day now that they were, as she had said, going out. "Please?"

"Ok. But pick me up from here, at the end of the road," Jasper said calmly, "Dad would freak even more if he saw the kind of cars you're family have. No offence but they really scream money."

"All right," Alice agreed.

"I'd best get going now," Jasper smiled at her softly, his hand reaching for the door handle. "It's been a great date Alice and I'm glad you enjoyed it…"

"Jasper, does our shopping trip count as a date?" Alice asked suddenly, a moment of inspiration coming to her. If he said yes…

"Um…why?" Jasper asked confused.

"Does it?" Alice asked.

"It could do if you wanted," Jasper nodded slowly, "Why?"

"Because then I can have a goodnight kiss," she said happily.

"What?" he asked, completely startled.

"It's one of my silly little rules about dating," she explained happily, "So, if you wanted to…you could kiss me goodnight." Jasper visibly swallowed hard. "Don't you want to kiss me?"

"Hell yes," he uttered, obviously before he could think it through as he flushed red and covered his mouth in absolute shock. "Sorry, I meant that…if you want a goodnight kiss I could…well I wouldn't mind…"

"So kiss me," she laughed softly.

"Ok," he mumbled, leaning over towards her as she leaned over to meet him. He licked his lips nervously and Alice couldn't help wondering for the briefest moment if this was his first kiss. If it was…and even if it wasn't…she was going to make it as special as possible for him. After all it was their first kiss as a couple…

Their lips touched softly at first and their eyes fluttered shut in sync. She tilted her head to the side and pressed her lips against his a little harder, encouraging him to deepen the kiss. It felt…magical. No matter how cheesy it sounded that was the only word she could really use to describe it. Magical. Her arms wound around his neck and shoulders as his good hand settled on her tiny waist.

The kiss was soft and gentle, at first just a pressing of their lips together but then slowly it grew deeper, their lips moving together. Alice couldn't stop herself moaning against his lips. It was perfect.

"Well," he coughed, a little awkwardly, as he lent back away from her. His hand searched for the door handle as he smiled nervously at her. "I guess I'll see you Monday. Um…night Alice."

"Sweet dreams!" she called out to him as he climbed out of the car.

"Yeah, sweet dreams," he smiled adorably down at her before he shut the door and walked away from the car. He never looked back at her as he hurried away and she knew she shouldn't have but she waited and watched and saw him disappear in to the third house on the right. It looked…awful. By far the worst on the street with half the fence missing, a huge rip in the old-fashioned gauze door, the paint chipped all over the house and no grass in the front garden, only mud. Poor Jasper. No wonder he hadn't wanted her to see his house.

It was only as she was driving home that she realised they'd never agreed on a time for her to pick him up.

A/N See, that's why I split it. Different POV's (sorta). Hope you liked it.


	17. Chapter 17

Disclaimer: I don't own Twilight or the characters in it. They belong entirely to Stephanie. I'm just borrowing them for a little while.

A/N All human in this story.

Warning: Child Abuse.

Rescue Me

Chapter Seventeen.

She was woken up when the love of her life, currently doubling as her pillow, tried to get out of the bed when the alarm went off on their bedside table. Grumbling in protest she tightened her arms about his waist, using her body weight to pull back down onto the bed once he's switched off the alarm.

"Esme," he said softly in her ear, pushing few of her wayward curls off of her face as he scowled softly down at her. "I have to go to work."

"It's a Saturday," she grumbled, turning her head so that her face was pressed into the smooth muscles of his chest. She knew she was a very lucky woman, a brilliant doctor with body of an Adonis… "You never work on a Saturday."

"Hank's off sick," Carlisle explained softly, pressing a kiss to her forehead, "I'm covering his Saturday shift until he gets better. It was only agreed yesterday."

"Oh…" she mumbled, thinking that her husband was far too nice for his own good. He already spent five long days and some nights at the hospital. Weekends were for family time, weekends were special to Esme…and today was Alice's date. "Have you…have you spoken to Alice yet?" she asked, sitting up in the bed and pulling up the top sheet to cover her nakedness.

"What about?" Carlisle asked as he slipped out of the bed, walking across the room and into their en suite bathroom with nothing on but his skin…

'No Esme! Don't get distracted!' she mentally snapped at herself before climbing out of the bed and walking after him, the sheet gather around her like a toga. "About her and Jasper," she said aloud, leaning against the doorframe as Carlisle stepped into the shower, the steam almost immediately fogging up the glass thanks to the cold air let in by the open window. He always left the window open.

"Esme, we gave all the kids the baby talk years ago," Carlisle's voice held confusion as he reminded her loudly.

"I know but I just think it would be better just to…to remind her to be careful…I mean this is her first ever real relationship, she's never been so serious about a boy before and…and…and I don't want her making the same mistake that I did," she mumbled as loudly as she could force herself to even though that wasn't really very loud at all. As ever when she thought about her past a lump formed in her stomach and she found it a little bit more difficult to breath.

"Esme…" Carlisle said softly, stepping out of the still running shower and facing her. At least now he had the decency to wrap a towel about his waist. This conversation was not one to be naked for. "…You did nothing wrong."

"Yes I did," her voice was choked now by the building tears that always accompanied this memory, "I killed my baby…"

There was only one person in the whole town that knew everything about her past and that was the man who now moved to hold her gently against his wet chest. The day before their marriage she had blurted out what she had done in her past, tired of keeping it a secret and worried that it would make him hate her. It hadn't, if anything it had made him love her more. He hadn't even hated her when the true consequences of her foolish actions had been discovered…

When she had been fifteen years old Esme had believed herself to be very much in love with an older man. Of course like any other infatuated teenager she believed that he loved her back just as much. When she had fallen pregnant she had found out the hard way that things were not as perfect as she had imagined them to be.

He was already married and had three sons. He made it very clear to her that all she had ever been to him was an easy lay. He'd given her enough money to get an abortion and then left. She'd never seen him again. Alone and scared she had gone to the clinic and suffered threw the worst moment of her life. But something had gone wrong with the awful procedure; they'd had to rush her to hospital and the thing that she had dreaded most had happened…

Her parents had been told.

Their anger and disappointment had made her hate herself even more than she had for going threw with it, for killing her baby. Her mother, a very religious woman, had told her that God had been punishing her for her sins when she had almost died from the abortion. Their relationship as a family had never been the same after that.

But something else, something far more important than their family had never been the same after that day…

Her body.

Having that abortion had taken away her ability to have children.

"Esme you were only fifteen, two years younger than Alice," Carlisle said softly, breaking her out of her memories as he kissed her hair with is warm lips, "You were frightened. You were about to become a single mother, a single teenage mother. I remember how single mothers were treated back then, worse than lepers! No one can blame you for what you did."

"They did…I did…I do…" she mumbled, shaking her head.

"Well I don't," Carlisle said firmly. Esme had heard him rant and rave for hours about how wrong abortions were these days, how lightly people took it, taking away a child's chance at living…but about her abortion he had never once said a cross word. Esme couldn't really understand that. "But if it will you make you feel better I will ring Alice once she's up and have a little talk with er about being safe."

"Thank you," Esme whispered, kissing his lips, "Thank you for being…well just for being you. And for not hating me…"

"I could never hate you Esme," he kissed her gently on the lips, "Now go back to bed. I need to finish my shower and head out or I'm going to be late. Relax today, enjoy your time off and I'll see you when I get home."

"Ok," she turned away and he stepped backwards the shower. She stopped and turned back to him. "Carlisle? I love you."

"I love you too," he told her with a smile, "Back to be with you."

She obeyed him with a little giggle but she hadn't been able to drop off to sleep until he'd gone, dressed in his smart work clothes. He'd kissed her goodbye gently and she finally drifted off to sleep again to the sound of the car zooming up the drive, away from the house.

"So how was your date honey?" Esme asked when Alice walked in from the garage, a goofy smile on her face. She'd been trying not to worry about Alice all day even though she'd overheard lice on the phone to Carlisle in the morning, talking about what Esme had asked him to talk about.

"It was wonderful," Alice giggled, rushing over and hugging her mother, "He is such a gentleman and he held my hand when the movie was scary…or when I pretended the movie was scary and he asked me out! Sort of! We're actually dating now!" Her voice got higher and higher as she went on, practically a squeak at the end.

"Oh Alice, I'm happy for you," Esme said genuinely.

"And we kissed! Oh Esme he is such a wonderful kisser! And so nice! And not at all like any other boys I know! Oh Esme…he's wonderful!" Alice cried happily. Apparently 'wonderful' was Alice's word for the day… "Is Carlisle home?"

"Not yet, honey. Why?" Esme asked as her daughter pulled out of the hug.

"We talked earlier and I wanted to reassure him that Jasper is way too much of a gentleman for anything like he was worried about to happen," Alice said matter-of-factly. "I told him some of what Carlisle had said, I was rambling and he got all flustered and embarrassed…"

"What was it that you and Carlisle talk about honey?" Esme asked, trying to act like she didn't know already, turning back to the dinner she had been preparing when Alice came in.

"Well…" Alice blushed deeply, "Sex."

"Oh," Esme mumbled.

"The having of with Jasper…" Alice mumbled, "And being…safe…and…and well like I said he's really nice and was just as embarrassed as me and I just wanted to reassure Carlisle so…" she trailed off, bright red.

"I'll tell him you want to speak to him when he gets home from the hospital," Esme said softly over her shoulder, somehow managing to hide how reassured she herself was. Her daughter had a much better view of sex than she had with her first 'serious' boyfriend. Alice was a sensible girl and by the sound of it Jasper was just as much of a gentleman as Alice said he was.

"Thanks mum!" Alice cried happily, kissing Esme's cheek before disappearing up to her room. Esme smiled and turned back to the salad she was preparing feeling much, much better.

A/N This was meant to be a happy, nice chapter for Esme but it turned out to be way different! Hope you liked it anyway. More soon.


	18. Chapter 18

Disclaimer: I don't own Twilight or the characters in it. They belong entirely to Stephanie. I'm just borrowing them for a little while.

A/N All human in this story.

Warning: Child Abuse.

Rescue Me

Chapter Eighteen. 

" _Good morning, good morning, we've talk the whole night through…"_

"No we haven't."

Alice glared at her giant brother and continued to sing the cheerful song as she poured herself a glass of orange juice.

" _Good morning, good morning to you. Good morning, good morning, it's great to stay up late. Good morning, good morning to you,_ " she picked up a lice of toast, added butter and marmite and took a bite, chewed, swallowed and continued with the song, " _When we left the movie show the future wasn't bright. But came the dawn, the show goes on and I don't want to say goodnight. So say good morning!"_

"Not at the breakfast table Alice," Esme said as she entered the kitchen carrying the laundry basket, full to the top with all their dirty clothes.

"Sorry Esme," Alice apologised before scoffing down her toast, "I don't need a lift this morning, I'm picking Jasper up in my own car today."

"Your car?" Edward asked in surprise, "You're taking your car to school?"

"Yes. What's wrong with that?" Alice asked.

"It's a Porche," Emmett pointed out.

"I do know what my car is Emmett," Alice snapped.

"Yeah but…a Porche…at our school…" he muttered, "People have a fit when we turn up in Rosalie's convertible. What do you think they'll do when they see your very noticeable, very expensive yellow Porche?"

"Stare," Alice shrugged, finishing her toast and standing up, "I'll see you all at school." She picked up her school bag and grabbed her car keys from the little row of hooks on the wall in the kitchen. "Bye Esme." She kissed her mothers cheek before heading into the garage.

Arriving at the spot she'd dropped Jasper off at before she cut the engine of her car, sitting back in her seat. She had no idea when he would be coming out of the house but she'd arrived so early that even if he didn't come out for half an hour they'd still get to their school with plenty of time.

After five minutes of waiting in silence Alice couldn't take it any more, she turned the key in the ignition only enough to turn the radio on. Unfortunately what was on the radio was truly awful and so she leaned across the car and opened the glove compartment, grabbing a handful of the loose CD's she kept in there. Flicking through them she eventually settled on a Kelly Clarkson CD.

Wrong choice.

It was the CD with all her depressing songs on, the one that was all about being alone and people leaving her and being sad. By the time she got the sixth song she couldn't take it any more and pushed the eject button, sticking in a random CD next time and hoping it was cheerful.

It was, it was the soundtrack to the musical by Monty Python - 'Spamalot'. This was much better, light and cheerful. Pressing the button to put the CD on random she settled back and very soon she was singing along at the top of her voice to the classic song known by everyone. 'Always Look On The Bright Side Of Life'.

She was checking her make-up in the rear view mirror when she noticed the door to Jasper's house had been flung open. Watching with wide eyes she saw her boyfriend walk out of the house only to be grabbed by the man who had followed him. The man was shouting at him but she couldn't hear what he said over the music. Jasper pulled away, stumbling down the steps and shaking his head. As he rushed out onto the pavement the man, Alice assumed it was Jasper's father, threw the beer bottle after Jasper, the glass shattering on the ground.

He hurried along the street and she saw it in his eyes when he saw the car. They widened almost comically and he turned back to look at the man now leaning heavily against the doorframe, shouting after him. When he started walking towards the car she knew exactly what he was thinking, he was trying to come up with an explanation of what she had just seen. She smiled softly at him when he climbed into the passenger seat, shoving his bag between his feet.

"Sorry," he mumbled quickly, "My dad's just had some bad news and I didn't do my chores either. He doesn't usually shout like that…"

"Oh," she mumbled softly, "You know you can tell me the truth…"

"That-That is the truth," he stuttered. Alice sighed. "It is. He's not normally like that. He's just having a bad day. It's nothing…I promise."

Alice couldn't believe him.

A/N So now Alice has seen a tiny bit of what Jasper is trying to hide…what is she gonna do about it? Any suggestions are welcome, they might be better than what I've thought up after all. LOL.


	19. Chapter 19

Disclaimer: I don't own Twilight or the characters in it. They belong entirely to Stephanie. I'm just borrowing them for a little while.

A/N All human in this story.

Warning: Child Abuse.

Rescue Me

Chapter Nineteen

Today was going to be a bad day.

Not only was his dad pissed in both senses of the word but he was also in a great deal of pain from the vicious beating he'd received the night before and Alice…Alice had seen a small part of the truth he had kept hidden.

Yes, today was going to be a bad day.

"Ugh!" he grunted softly as his seatbelt pulled on his bruised/possibly broken ribs, courtesy of his dad of course. Alice glanced across at him, worry in her pretty blue eyes. A horrible feeling of guilt began to burn in his stomach as he smiled at her and lied through his teeth, using too many years of practise to make it sound believable, "I caught myself on the kitchen table last night. Nothing to worry about."

"Are you sure?" Alice asked softly, being more gentle with the turn this time as she brought her car into the already busy car park of their school. "Have you taken anything for it? We could go to the nurse or something…"

"No, I'm fine. Honest," he spilled brightly at her, silently urging her not to worry, not to keep asking him questions he didn't want to answer. Couldn't answer. Oh how he wished he could stop lying to her…but he never would. He had to keep up the lies to keep her safe. If she ever found out the truth…well Jasper knew that she would fight for him and she would loose…she would get hurt.

And he would not allow that monster to hurt her, to taint her beauty and her innocence with his evil. He would do **anything** to keep that from happening, to keep her safe…even lie to her.

"Well if you're sure…"

"I'm sure…Oh My God…" he gasped, looking away from her and finally seeing all the eyes following them as she manoeuvred the car to an empty space in the centre of the car park. "Everyone is staring at us."

"No they aren't," Alice shook her head as she expertly parked the car between the lines and turned off the engine, the music he hadn't been listening to cutting out immediately, "They're staring at the car."

"Same difference," Jasper mumbled, squirming uncomfortably in his seat as people tried to peer in the windows and see who the occupants of the stunning car were. He winced as his ribs protested to his movement but luckily Alice was too busy grabbing her bag from under her seat.

"Come on Jasper, have a little fun. They're all jealous of us because of the car, enjoy it," she grinned cheekily across the car at him before opening her door and stepping out smoothly, brushing her skirt down as she moved so that she didn't show anyone what underwear she was wearing that day.

"Enjoy having everyone stare at me?" Jasper muttered, "Not gonna happen."

Sighing deeply he opened his own door and climbed out awkwardly, his good arm curling around his side to protect his ribs. A murmur went around the crowd gathering around the car as they saw who was with Alice Cullen…

"…whys she giving him a ride?"

"…they're friends now, remember?"

"…I heard they were more that friends…"

"…I heard she was taking pity on him…"

"…Obviously, I mean who would want someone like him?"

"…hey, we can call them the 'Princess and the Pauper'…"

He grit his teeth and tried to ignore the comments, reaching in and picking up his tatty bag before shutting the door. By then Alice was at his side and, ignoring the whispers and murmurs, she linked her arm with his and pressed a kiss to his cheek.

"Ready to go in, Jazz?" she asked.

"Sure," Jasper agreed, really, really ready to get away from the attention, "I'll walk you to your tutor room." (A/N I _think_ you American's call this 'Home Room' but I might be mistaken. What I mean is when a teacher takes the register and gives any announcements for the day.)

"Thanks Jazz," she smiled up at him, pressing the lock button on her keys and making the car click twice loudly, signalling that it was now secure. They started to walk towards the school together, the crowd torn between studying the car and watching them. But those who chose the latter got a little extra show… "Hey Jazz?"

"Yeah?" Jasper asked as Alice stopped, making him stop too.

"Let's just make sure everyone knows about us," Alice said calmly.

"Huh?" Jasper asked.

"I don't want anyone hitting on you now you're mine," she giggled softly before moving up onto her tiptoes and pressing her soft lips to him. Her arms slid around his neck and she clung to him, his hands automatically taking gentle but firm holding on her hips to help her keep her balance.

"…"

There was a stunned silence from the crowd as Alice proceeded to kiss the life out of him, not that he was complaining.

What had he done to earn such a fantastic, wonderful, beautiful, loving girl? Nothing. That's what he'd done. Absolutely nothing. Which meant, obviously, that it was never going to last. But if that was the case…well Jasper was going to enjoy every second of this relationship as long as it lasted.

So he kissed her back, ignoring the pain of his split lip, the pain of his ribs and his healing hand…he kissed her back in front of most of his peers…most of his very jealous peers…

Wait. Jealous? They were jealous of him?

Turning her body slightly he looked over the top of her head and confirmed that yes, the guys who had been ogling the car and were now staring at them, were jealous…of him! They were jealous of him, Jasper Whitlock. Ok, he could understand why…who wouldn't be jealous of the guy who got to kiss Alice Cullen…but still…jealous of him?

"There. That's better," Alice giggled as she leaned back and took his good hand in hers, "Shall we go in now?" He nodded and allowed himself to be pulled up the steps towards the school.

Maybe…maybe today wasn't going to be such a bad day after all.

A/N Yay! An update! I'm so proud…and so sorry for making you wait so long! Hope you liked it. Suggestion/Comment are most welcome.


	20. Chapter 20

Disclaimer: I don't own Twilight or the characters in it. They belong entirely to Stephanie. I'm just borrowing them for a little while.

A/N All human in this story.

Warning: Child Abuse.

Rescue Me

Chapter Twenty

Today was shaping up to be an ordinary day, as boring as any other. The one highlight so far had been when Bella had made him a bacon sandwich for his breakfast. He had, however, managed to get ketchup on his trousers. Not so good.

Nothing had happened on the way in despite his longing to catch someone speeding or breaking some other traffic law. And unsurprisingly there had been nothing waiting for him at the station, no crime that needed solving, nothing that needed his expert attention.

Within ten minutes of arriving at the station he had been reduced to playing pinball on his computer in an attempt to fight off the boredom. Oh, why couldn't anything exciting ever happen?

"Chief!" his young deputy cried out loudly as he ran into the room, almost giving Charlie a heart attack and completely ruining his perfect streak on the game.

"What?" he asked, sounding a little bit annoyed.

"There's a fight in 'Joe's Bar'!" his deputy all but shouted, struggling not to bounce around in his excitement as he got his gear ready.

"A fight?" Charlie asked in shock, "But…what…how…?"

"A patron at Joe's called it in," his deputy said as Charlie rose from his chair, pulling on his own jacket as he listened, "Apparently a guy came in an hour or so ago, already well on his way to being pissed and he turned nasty a few minutes ago when Joe refused to serve him any more drinks."

"Drunk? But it's not even 12:30…" Charlie mumbled in shock.

"I know," his deputy agreed, "The patron said the guy was getting more and more violent so we'd better hurry Chief or someone's really gonna get hurt…"

"Have you put word out for the ambulance to meet us there?" Charlie asked as the pair of them rushed out towards to the car, yanking open the doors and sliding into the seats. His deputy, Mike, Charlie snapped mentally to himself that he needed to think of the kid by his name, nodded. "Let's go then."

Finally, a bit of action!

"Give me a fucking drink!" they heard the shout as they stepped into the bar, pausing in the doorway to assess the scene. A man, holding a broken pool cue threateningly, was swaying on his feet as he threatened Joe across the bar. Joe had definitely seen better days, he was bruised and both his lip and his eyebrow were split, trickling blood down his face. Cowering behind him was his young bar maid, Annie, poor kid looked terrified. And two of the bars patrons were on the floor at the mans feet, unconscious with nasty cuts and bruises to their foreheads, like their heads had been smashed into the bar..."Give me a drink now!"

"Sir, I've already told you that I will not serve you any more drink today. You've had enough. Now I want you to leave my-" Joe's calm speech was cut off by the man hitting him in the face with the sharp end of the broken pool cue. Annie screamed as Joe dropped to the ground, clutching at his bleeding face.

"Get me a drink, bitch!" the man ordered her as she knelt beside her boss.

"I'll get his attention, you get the cuffs on him," Charlie ordered Mike in a whisper before he stepped into the room, his hand resting on his gun…not that he really wanted to use it. He'd never shot a human being before… "Sir? Sir, I think you should calm down…"

"Who the fuck do you think you are?" the man growled before spinning around, stumbling against the bar as he did so, his eyes glaring towards Charlie.

"My name is Chief Swan," Charlie said calmly, "Now I want you to calm down and come with me quietly…"

"Why the fuck would I go with you? I want a drink," he said, slamming his fist down on the bar, making poor Annie jump and cry out again, "Shut up you stupid bitch and get me a drink."

"Sir, you will be coming down the station with me," Charlie growled, sick of the mans attitude and language already. The man turned to him once more, his face set in a hard glare, a snarl leaving his lips.

"What? Are you arresting me or something?" he demanded.

"Yes," Charlie said shortly, pulling out his own cuffs as he saw Mike moving closer towards the man from behind, his cuffs all ready to snap around the mans wrist. "I am arresting you for-"

"No!" the man growled loudly, almost sounding like a battle cry as he jumped towards Charlie, startling all of them with the suddenness of it. Charlie didn't have time to react before a heavy fist smashed into his eye.

"Chief!" Mike called out in shock as Charlie hit the wall hard, falling to the ground in a dazed head. The man grabbed him by his short hair and smashed his head into the ground once, twice, three times…

He was so dazed he could barely see straight let alone think. Vagually he realised that his assailant was gone but the shouting was still there. Closing his eyes for a few moments he was thankful that his vision was a little less blurry when he opened his eyes the next time…and was met by an amusing sight.

Mike, skinny little Mike who sometimes had trouble opening bottles of Coca Cola had forced the guy to the ground, pressing his knee between the mans shoulder blades and was expertly putting the cuffs on him whilst reading him his rights over the mans shouting and swearing.

"…have the right to remain silent, anything you say can and will be used in court so I suggest you shut the hell up!" Mike finally lost his cool.

"Nicely done, Mike," Charlie muttered, reaching up and pressing a hand to the back of his head. It came away bloody. "Aw damn…Bella's gonna kill me…"

"Stay where you are Chief, you need to get seen by a paramedic," Mike ordered firmly, pressing down on the mans back, "And you stay where you are too so you don't get yourself in even more trouble."

"Get the fuck off me you-" Charlie interrupted, asking,

"What's your name?" For the first time since they arrived there the man shut up, glaring across at Charlie in silence. "Mike, check him for ID."

"Yes Chief," Mike said, feeling the mans pockets and eventually pulling out an empty wallet, empty for all but an expired drivers licence, "Ethan Whitlock."

"Whitlock?" Charlie asked softly, in his concussed state unable to immediately remember why that name was family. "Whitlock…why do I know that name? Whitlock…Whitlock…oh…the kid in the ER…"

Well…this day just got really, really interesting…

A/N I've updated! Woo! Bit short I know but…well I've been working so hard on 'OLAL' that I neglected this story, poor thing, but here we are with another pain filled chapter…tell me what you think should happen next. I've got a basic idea but suggestions are always welcome.


	21. Chapter 21

Disclaimer: I don't own Twilight or the characters in it. They belong entirely to Stephanie. I'm just borrowing them for a little while.

A/N All human in this story.

Warning: Child Abuse.

Rescue Me

Chapter Twenty-One

"Aw…shit…"

"Nice to see you too, Mr Whitlock."

Jasper glared at the cop who was leaning oh so casually against his police car which was parked directly in front of their house and was attracting way too much attention from their nosey neighbours. Wonderful.

"You walk every day?" Chief Swan asked, frowning slightly at the thought.

"No, only when my girlfriend can't give me a lift. She had to stay on late today to work on her art project," Jasper explained, his voice a little tense as he folded his arms across his chest. "What are you doing here?"

"I need to speak to you about your father."

"I have nothing to say to you about my father," Jasper spat angrily, turning away from the police officer and heading up the steps to the his front door.

"He's under arrest."

"What?" Jasper gasped, spinning round to stare down at the policeman. Only now did he notice the vivid black eye the Chief of Police was sporting. "What for?"

"Drunk and disorderly," Chief Swan answered simply, causing Jasper to sigh. Of course it was. But as he went speak the policeman continued, "Three counts of aggravated assault resulting in grievous bodily harm. Not to mention resisting arrest." Jasper felt his jaw drop in shock. His dad had…had…"Oh…and one count of assaulting a police officer. Me."

"Shit!"

"Yes….shit," Chief Swan repeated softly, looking slightly uncomfortable as he used the swear word. Jasper would have found this funny had the situation not been so completely serious.

"How much trouble is he in?" Jasper asked whilst at the same time worrying about where on Earth he was going to get bail money from.

"Why don't we go inside and talk this over in private?" Chief Swan suggested, nodding towards the run down house. Jasper nodded softly, using his key in the door, silently praying that his dad hadn't trashed the place on his way out to get arrested…

He had.

"Um…it's not normally like this," Jasper muttered, flushing red with embarrassment as he dropped his book bag onto the stairs and set about picking up the empty liquor bottles that were everywhere. He noticed the frown on Chief Swan face as he looked around the living room; he was probably comparing it to his own home. Jasper felt even more ashamed. "So…what now?"

"You'll need to come down the station with me to post your dad's bail," Chief Swan explained calmly. Jasper froze, his hand outstretched to pick up another bottle. Bail. "Will that be a problem?"

"H-How much will the bail be?" Jasper asked softly. A dawning realisation filled Chief Swan's eyes as he looked about the place once more, saw the threadbare furniture and all the other humiliating signs of their lack of money.

"Oh, I see…" Chief Swan nodded sadly. "Well…if there are…insufficient funds to pay for your fathers bail then he will have to remain in police custody until the date of the trial. And if that's the case then I'm afraid that we will be obligated to hand you over to child services…"

"What?" Jasper gasped, "But…I'll be fine on my own."

"That might be the case but you're under-age, we are legally obligated to involve child services…although I think they should have been involved a long time ago, shouldn't they?" Chief Swan asked softly, his kind eyes searching for Jaspers, staring deep into his very soul.

So this was it, the time had come to confess all…

"Yes…" he admitted sadly, his voice little more than a whisper.

"Jasper, we've already got your father under arrest. If you tell me the truth now we can…we can add the proper charges to the already existing ones," Chief Swan said, his voice shaking with emotion. "He can't hurt you any more…"

"I…I don't know what to say," Jasper mumbled, tears filling his eyes, "I've never…ever told anyone and I don't know how…I…I don't…"

"You don't need to tell me everything right now. Ideally we should have that conversation down the station with a child advocate present," Chief Swan said kindly, "But right now I just need to know one thing, then I can start the ball rolling…does your father abuse you?"

"Yes…"

A/N This was ridiculously tough to write which is why it's so short. Hope it did the tough job ok. R & R with comments and suggestions.


	22. Chapter 22

Disclaimer: I don't own Twilight or the characters in it. They belong entirely to Stephanie. I'm just borrowing them for a little while.

A/N All human in this story.

Warning: Child Abuse.

Rescue Me

Chapter Twenty-Two

Carlisle was hidden in his office eating his (rather late) lunch when the phone rang. He groaned loudly and for the first time in his life considered ignoring the call…but then his conscious stabbed at him and quite rightly so. The receptionists knew he was taking his first break of the long day and they wouldn't have put a call through unless it was an emergency.

"Cullen," he said as he picked up the phone, dropping his barely touched sandwich back into his Tupperware lunch box.

"Sorry to interrupt your break, Dr Cullen, but I've got Chief Swan on the line and he says it's urgent."

"Oh," Carlisle mumbled. He'd heard from one of the other ER doctors that the Chief of police had been a patient himself earlier that day after someone they had been arresting turned violent. A bad feeling began to grow in his gut as he asked the receptionist to put the call through.

"Carlisle?" Charlie's voice was heavy with worry, a fact that worsened Carlisle's gut feeling. "I don't know if you've heard about what happened earlier…"

"You ended up in hospital with nasty black eye and a slight concussion," Carlisle interrupted him, "How is your head feeling, by the way?"

"Better. Look, the guy we arrested earlier, the violent drunk…it was Ethan Whitlock," Charlie explained quickly. "When I went to tell the kid, Jasper, he admitted to me that his dad abuses him at home. He's down at the station with me at the moment; we're waiting on child services before he makes his statement. I was hoping you could come down and give him a check-up," Charlie sighed deeply, "He's got some fresh looking bruises and we'll need a list of them for his statement…"

"I'll be right there. And I'll bring a copy of his personal fill. That should help with the case against that bastard," Carlisle growled, so angry with the man at that moment he did something he normally wouldn't do - he swore.

"I hadn't thought of that," Charlie muttered, obviously annoyed with himself.

"Also wouldn't it be better for me to do the examination here?" Carlisle suggested as the thought entered his mind. "A judge might frown at a medical examination being done at the station…"

"Damn. I hadn't thought of that either," Charlie muttered, now very annoyed with himself. "I'll bring the kid over once the woman from child services gets here."

"Ok. I'll let the staff know to send you in straight away," Carlisle said, already searching on his computer for the electronic copy of Jaspers file. Charlie said a hurried goodbye and Carlisle heard him barking orders before the line went dead.

Sighing sadly Carlisle called the necessary people and gave some orders of his own whilst telling the computer to print the horrifying large folder of information that was Jasper Whitlocks medical history. This done he settled back into his chair and watched pages shooting out of the state of the art printer. His stomach growled loudly, he hadn't eaten since six am and so he picked up his sandwich and took a bite…but it didn't taste the same as it had done before. Gone was the pleasant taste of tuna and cucumber and in its place was…ash.

Dropping the rest of the sandwich into the bin he resigned himself to going hungry for the rest of the day and settled back into his chair and lost himself to his worried thoughts about poor Jasper…

A/N Big, big, big apologies for the length of this chapter. I haven't been very well and I kinda feel that the next bit of the story needs to be told from Jaspers POV.


	23. Chapter 23

Chapter Twenty-Three

            Within five minutes of meeting the woman Jasper had decided that he didn’t like her. She was supposed to be his “child advocate”, sent to represent him and help him through this difficult and painful experience but instead all she’s done so far was look down her nose at him, flirt incessantly with Dr Cullen and inspect her nails for chips or cracks in the bright red colour.

            “Do you work out?” she asked suddenly as Dr Cullen continued his thorough examination of Jasper. The nurse assisting him and taking his notes actually hissed in the woman’s direction. “You look like you work out.”

            “Miss Peyton, either do your job or get out,” Dr Cullen snapped at her. Apparently his opinion of the woman wasn’t much better than Jasper’s own and the nurse now looked about ready to scratch her eyes out.

            “Well I would but there isn’t much for me to do until he’s given his statement,” the woman said with a casual shrug, “Then I’ll just drop him off at the children’s home in Seattle, fill our my paperwork and then how about we go out for dinner? I know this lovely little Italian restaurant…”

            “You…you…” the nurse gasped, rounding on the woman, “You bitch!”

            “Excuse me? What did you call me?” the woman demanded angrily.

            “You heard me!” the nurse now seemed to be literally holding herself back, not that Jasper could blame her. Wasn’t it just his luck that he would get the social worker who was more interested in getting into Dr Cullen’s pants than helping him.

            “Woman,” Dr Cullen addressed her coldly as he turned to face her, “You disgust me. This poor boy needs our help and you act like what has happened to him is nothing. What’s even worse is that you seem to be far more interesting in thrusting yourself at me than doing your job.” Dr Cullen’s voice was cold and serious and Jasper watched as the woman flushed with embarrassment but not shame. “You will leave this hospital immediately. If this is the level of assistance you wish to give then we will all be myself and Chief Swan can do without you.”

            “Legally…”

            “Legally be damned! I will be contacting your superiors and placing a formal complaint against you,” Dr Cullen growled and Jasper watched as the woman’s embarrassment turned to fear. Jasper assumed that a complaint of this nature would result in her loosing her job…“I will demand your resignation as you obviously couldn’t give a damn about the children you are supposed to be helping.”

            Yep, she was going to loose her job.

            “There’s no need to be so dramatic,” the woman pouted childishly, stepping forwards so that she could trail her hands slowly and seductively down the shocked and angry doctors chest, “I’m sure we can work something out…”

            Jasper could hardly believe this woman was for real but looking at her again he realised that she was the type of woman who had never been refused anything.

            “Nurse. Call security and have this woman removed from the hospital,” Dr Cullen ordered, stepping back from the now stunned social worker. “And could you also call my wife and have her make up the bed in the spare room. Jasper can stay with us for now.”

            Wait…what?

            Jasper stared at the Doctor in shock as he turned his back on the woman, picking up the clipboard and pen the nurse had set aside before rushing to the phone mounted on the wall by the door, gladly calling security to come and remove the stunned woman.

            “Sorry about all this, Jasper,” he apologised as he continued where he had left off in his earlier examination, noting down the injuries he discovered as he went along.

            “Did you…did you mean that?” Jasper asked softly.

            “Did I mean what?” Dr Cullen asked as the door opened and a huge man dressed in the smart black uniform of a security guard entered. The nurse directed him to the woman and this seemed to break her out of her shocked state…

            “You can’t do this to me!” she screamed loudly as the security guard took her by the arm and pulled her towards the door. “If you were married you should have said so earlier! There’s no need to be so dramatic!”

            “Get her out of here!” Dr Cullen snapped over her shoulder.

            The security guard manhandled the angry woman out of the room and if the glare he received was anything to go by, Jasper got the feeling that she was going to blame all of this on him rather than accepting the blame herself.

            “That’s better,” Dr Cullen said once she was gone, handing the clipboard back to the Nurse who looked much happier now. “I’m going to put some cream on your cuts and bruises to help them to heal, ok, Jasper?”

            “O-Ok…am I…am I really going home with you and…and Alice?” Jasper asked softly as the doctor started applying some odd smelling cream to the bruises on his right arm.

            “Yes,” Dr Cullen nodded, “But I’ll warn you now, I don’t allow any hanky panky in my house,” the warning was said with a smile but still managed to cause Jasper to flush red with embarrassment. “My wife and I will be glad to have you.”

            “…thank you…”

            Ok, Jasper thought to himself as the doctor gently rubbed the cream into the cuts and bruises all over his exposed body, this man was quite possibly the kindest and most loving man he had ever met.

No one had ever given a damn about him before.

            The thought of being welcomed into the kind family Alice had described to him actually brought tears to his eyes.

            “Are you ok?” the nurse asked, her voice filled with concern.

            “Yeah…” Jasper mumbled, wiping his eyes with the awkward fingers of his broken hand. “I just…I never thought…”

            “Everything’s going to be ok, Jasper,” Dr Cullen said, his voice soft and reassuring. “Once I’ve done this there are a couple of cuts to your back that I want to take a closer look at and then once I’m satisfied with your treatment we’ll go to my office where Chief Swan is waiting and you can give your…your statement.”

            “Right…” Jasper mumbled, worrying his lip between his teeth as he thought of the difficult talk that was ahead of him. He’d never talked about this before…he didn’t even know if he could talk about it…

            “Don’t worry, Jasper, both myself and Nurse Jackson will be with you the entire time and Charlie…Chief Swan is a good guy – he just wants to help you. We all do,” Dr Cullen said comfortingly, resting his hand of Jaspers left shoulder which was reasonably un-bruised, squeezing it gently.

            “O-Ok…”

 

~ * ~ * ~

 

            “My dad was different when I was little, before my mum died. He was in the army so he was away a lot and when he was home he was a bit strict but he wasn’t…he wasn’t like he is now. He was…nice…

            “Then my mum died and he…changed.

            “I was…I was eight and it was my fault. He’s always blamed me for taking her away from him. He hates me for it. When…when he gets depressed he asks me why it couldn’t have been me and…and sometimes I…sometimes I wish it had been…”

            “Jasper,” Dr Cullen said softly and yet sternly, “You were only a child. Whatever happened to your mother…it wasn’t your fault.”

            “Yes, it was,” Jasper interrupted him. “I was riding my new bike – showing off. My mum told me to stay on the pavement but…but the pavement was boring so…so I went out into the road. There was…there was a lorry and…and I froze…my mum…my mum ran into the road and pushed me out of the way but…she died.”

            “I’m sorry, Jasper,” Dr Cullen with sympathy. “But it wasn’t your fault. Your mother made a choice, the same one I would have made if it had been one of my own children in danger. It was a horrible tragedy but it wasn’t your fault.”

            “After the…accident…my dad wouldn’t talk to me, wouldn’t even look at me. I wasn’t…I wasn’t allowed to go to the funeral…to say goodbye…” Jasper raised a trembling hand to his eyes and brushed away his tears. “He started drinking after the accident and eventually it got so bad that he was kicked out of the Army. That…that was when he started to notice me again and…and I wished he didn’t…

            “He started to…to beat me when he got angry…or…or drunk. If something went wrong for him it was…was worse for me and…and it’s just continued to get worse as I’ve grown up. I…I look a lot like my mum and he…he hates the constant reminder of what he’s lost…what I took away from him…”

            “Jasper, did he ever sexually abuse you?” Chief Swan asked from where he stood on the other side of the room, holding the police issue tape recorder. “Did he ever touch-”

            “No,” Jasper interrupted quickly, “No. He didn’t…want me. Not like that. He wanted my mum and he…he hated me for taking her away from him but…but he never did anything like that…I swear…never…”

            “Will you be willing to testify against your father in a court of law, Jasper?” Chief Swan asked. “We’ve got enough evidence and witnesses to charge him for the assault and battery but we’ll need your testimony to charge him for child abuse.”

            “I…I want to say yes but…but I’m frightened…” Jasper whispered, fear and shame twisting in his gut. He was afraid of a drunk who was currently locked away in a jail cell.

            He was such a coward.

            “Jasper, we wont let him hurt you any more,” Dr Cullen said and Jasper almost screamed and fought out of pure reflex when the kind man put an arm around his shoulders. “I won’t let him hurt you any more. I promise.”

            Their eyes met and Jasper could read each and every emotion the kind doctor was feeling in his beautiful blue eyes – fear, pain, anger, disgust, pity, compassion, hope, love – a complete jumble of confusing emotions that filled Jaspers heart with a warmth he hadn’t felt in years. This was the sort of man a father should be, the sort of man Jasper had always wanted for a father.

            “I’ll…I’ll testify…but…”

            “But what?”

            “But…he’s my dad…” Jasper mumbled, “He was…he was a good man once and…and I think he could be again…if he got some help with his drinking and…and everything…”

            “After everything he’s done to you, you want to help him?” Chief Swan asked in genuine surprise. Dr Cullen however was smiling as Jasper slowly nodded. “Why?”

            “Because…it’s the right thing to do. I don’t want…I don’t want to live with him any more and I agree that he should be taken off the streets before he seriously hurts someone…or worse…but I don’t want to just…abandon him,” Jasper explained softly.

            “I understand, Jasper,” Dr Cullen said softly, his hand rubbing comfortingly at Jaspers arm, “I’m sure that something can be arranged for your father to receive the help he needs during his prison sentence.”

            “Thank you…” Jasper sighed, allowing his body to sink into the doctors comforting arms. “I never thought…I didn’t…” he mumbled, shaking his head from side to side as he tried to process all that was happening. “I didn’t think…I didn’t think anyone would ever want to help me…”

            “We’ll help you, Jasper,” Dr Cullen said, his words bringing more tears to his eyes.

            “Thank…thank you…”

            And then something just sort of snapped inside of him and the next thing he knew he was sobbing uncontrollably in the kind doctor’s arms, his face pressed against his chest, his tears staining the fabric of his shirt as his good hand clutched tightly at the soft material. He was safe and…and someone cared…

            Someone cared…

 

A/N I meant to get this finished a week or so ago but my computer died. I lost everything on my hard-drive and I’m still re-building everything that I lost. Hope you liked the chapter. Comments are always welcome.


	24. Chapter 24

Chapter Twenty-Four

            She had been busy re-making all the beds in the house when the phone rang. Perching on the edge of her own half-made bed, left till last because it was the largest bed in the house and took the longest to make, she picked up the phone from Carlisle’s nightstand, answering with a bright,

            “Hello?”

            “Mrs Cullen?” the woman on the other end of the line asked softly. Esme hummed softly in confirmation of her identity, trying to figure out why the woman’s voice was familiar to her. “This is Nurse Jackson, I work with your husband-”

            “Has something happened to Carlisle?” she asked, her voice raising as panic coursed through her veins as all sorts of different scenarios popped into her head – this was her worst nightmare. “Is he ok?”

            “He’s fine,” Nurse Jackson said quickly. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to worry you,” she sounded genuinely apologetic and Esme couldn’t help the sigh of relief that escaped her. “I’m calling to give you a message from Dr Cullen because he’s a little bit busy at the moment. He wants me to ask you to get the guest room ready because he will be bringing company home with him.”

            “Who?” Esme asked.

            “I’m afraid I can’t tell you too much,” the nurse apologised softly, “The situation is a little…complicated and the police are involved. All I can tell you is that we have been treating a teenage boy who is…unable to go home.”

            “Oh no…” Esme gasped sympathetically, her mind now supplying all the reasons that the poor boy couldn’t go home. Sometimes she cursed her over-active imagination.

            “The social worker that was sent to handle his case was…well there isn’t a word I can think of to describe her behaviour but Dr Cullen and myself will both be putting in letters of complaint against her. She was all for throwing the boy in an orphanage…”

            “No!” Esme gasped in shock.

            “Yes. She was…despicable. Dr Cullen had her thrown out and has offered to take the boy in so that he won’t have to go into care, so that he can stay with someone who is actually thinking of his well-being,” the nurse finished her explanation and Esme found herself nodding in agreement.

            “Please tell Carlisle that I will get the guest room ready and I’ll also inform the children of what has happened,” she said, her voice filled with determination. “Am I…am I allowed to know the boys name?”

            “I don’t know…” the nurse said.

            “Don’t worry. I wouldn’t want you to get in trouble,” Esme said quickly.

            “Sorry,” the nurse apologised, “I’d best get back…”

            “Of course,” Esme agreed, saying farewell to the nurse before hanging up the phone, replacing it into its charger.

For a moment she just sat, worrying about what could have happened to the poor boy and then she pulled herself together, abandoning her own half-made bed in favour of rushing to get the guest room ready, filled with determination to make everything perfect so that they could help the poor boy in any way they could.

 

~ * ~ * ~

 

            Informing the children about the guest Carlisle was bringing home with him had gone almost exactly as Esme had predicted. She’d called them together in the living room, perching on the coffee table opposite them as they squashed onto one sofa. As ever when they sat like this Alice was the one squished in the middle and Emmett had been relegated to perching on the armrest.

            A smile flashed briefly across her face as she remembered how often she and Carlisle had watched the four of them fall asleep all squished up on the sofa, back when they were younger and could aril fit on the cushions together.

            “A guest?” Edward had asked.

            “What sort of a guest?” Rosalie had been immediately suspicious.

            “One of Carlisle’s patients who needs a place to stay and someone to look after him,” Esme had explained, sighing sadly as the suspicious look remained in her eldest daughters eyes. Poor Rosalie.

When they had adopted her they had been told about her background, told what her father had been convicted of…child pornography. Esme had been physically sick, filled with worry that the evil man had done something to the poor little girl but nothing had ever been confirmed and Rosalie had never spoke about it.

But she still worried…and she wasn’t a violent person by nature, in fact she abhorred violence…but sometimes she wished she could have five mutes alone with Rosalie’s biological father…with a baseball bat.

            That horrible man deserved much worse.

            “Who?” Emmett had asked, startling her out of her unusually dark thoughts.

            “I don’t know,” she’d answered truthfully and at once the tension in the room rose. Alice had looked worried. Edward had taken over the job of looking suspicious from his blond sister. Emmett had taken on a rather adorable confused look. And Rosalie had gone blank, cutting off all her emotions and retreating into herself like she had when she had first come to them as a little girl. “The Nurse I spoke to couldn’t tell me over the phone because of the circumstances surrounding his case,” she had explained and the suspicion had slowly faded out of Edwards eyes, replaced by understanding. “All I know is that it is a teenage boy who needs our help. Now, I want you all to be nice to him when he arrives – he’ll be nervous and frightened so we need to show him that he is welcome here. Just like we made sure that you knew you were welcome here when each of you joined out family.”

            They agreed, Emmett announcing that it’s be good to have another dude in the house and she’d left them to talk about the latest turn of events as she went to start cooking dinner for everyone.

            “Carlisles car just pulled up,” Alice told her fifteen minutes later, stepping some of the cheese Esme had been grating, earning herself a slap to the back of the hand. “We’re gonna wait in the living room. Emmett wanted to wait at the front door but we talked him out of it,” she explained with a smile, “Last thing the guy needs is to be ambushed by us as soon as he steps through the door, right?”

            “Right,” Esme agreed with a chuckle, moving the bowl of cheese out of her daughters reach before checking on the timer by the oven. “I’ll come with you. I’ve got five minutes or so before I need to put the pasta on.”

            The two had just arrived in the living room when they heard the sound of the front door opening. Nervously she smoothed back her hair and straightened the pretty apron he wore (a practical but stylish apron made by Alice as a Christmas present), listening to Carlisle as he led their guests up the stairs.

            “…and up here on the first level is the living room,” he said as he stepped into the room, smiling around at his gathered family. He turned to say something more, probably to introduce them all as the boy stepped into the room after the kind hearted doctor but he was cut off by a loud gasp from Alice,

            “Jasper?!?”

 

A/N There we go, another chapter at last. Sorry it took so long – life has been so crazy! I’ve barely had time to think let alone write! Hope you liked it.


	25. Chapter 25

 

Chapter Twenty-Five

__

_“Jasper?!?”_

Alice practically flew across the room in her hurry to throw her arms around her bruised and battered boyfriend, a move that brought forth a loud grunt of pain from the blond haired boy.

            “Oh! Sorry!” Alice gasped, making as if to step back but Jasper tightened his arms around her, holding her close and pressing his face into her hair.

            He was shaking.

            “Jasper is going to be staying with us for a little while,” Carlisle explained to his family, placing a gentle hand on Jaspers shoulder.

            Alice felt him tense up and automatically began to rub his back soothingly, pressing her face into his strong chest. She couldn’t believe this was happening! Well…actually (sadly) she could – after all, she’d sort of known about the abuse her poor boyfriend had suffered but he didn’t know she knew and she hadn’t dared to guess as to how bad it was but obviously it was bad if he was coming to live with them –

            “I hope you’ll all make him feel welcome in our home,” Carlisles calm voice interrupted her frantic thoughts. “Now, Jasper, you obviously know Alice,” Carlisle continued, a little humour creeping into his voice, “And I’m assuming that you know the others from your classes at school?”

            Jasper nodded.

            Alice took this opportunity to step out of his embrace, moving to stand at his side and taking hold of his good hand. She smiled softly when Jasper squeezed her hand, his eyes silently thanking her for her comfort and support.

            “Good. Now you don’t have to call me Dr Cullen while you’re staying with us – you may call me Carlisle,” he continued, smiling warmly at the nervous boy.

            “O-Ok…” Jasper agreed softly.

            “And this is my wife, Esme,” Carlisle said, holding his hand out to his wife who eagerly walked over to take it, holding it with both of her own as she stood in front of Jasper with one of her kindest smiles on her pretty face.

            “Hello, Jasper, it’s nice to finally meet you. Alice has told me all about you,” Esme said warmly as though he were joining them for tea, not moving in because of…well just because. Alice felt her cheeks burn red with embarrassment.

            “Mum!” she protested, causing her siblings to chuckle at her predicament.

            “Now, how about we head upstairs and give you a quick tour of the house before getting you settled into your room?” Esme suggested happily. “I’ve borrowed some of Edwards clothes for you to wear until we can collect your from your old house.”

            “Oh, um…thank you,” Jasper mumbled, blushing as he kept hold of Alice’s hand.

            “I’ll come too,” she announced, squeezing his hand reassuringly.

            Like she would abandon him now, when he was recovering from what was undoubtedly as shocking and traumatic day and dealing with her mad family.

            “That’s fine, Alice, dear,” Esme agreed warmly, turning to kiss her husband on the cheek before she released his hand and headed up the stairs.

Alice followed her, ignoring her siblings who were still chuckling from her embarrassed expression earlier, relishing in the fact that it wasn’t one of them suffering from their parents comments and observations and pulled Jasper along with her.

            Esme took them all round the first floor of the house, explaining what each room was for and if it was a bedroom who it belonged to. Both of the girls slept on the first floor whilst everyone else slept on the second floor.

Jasper had gained a wide-eyed ‘deer-in-the-headlights’ expression as he was led around the large and rather extravagant house. Alice sighed, trying desperately not to feel sorry for him. She seriously doubted that the inside of his house had been much better than what she’d seen of the outside.

Once they’d finished with the first floor they headed up to the second which was all bedrooms. First was Emmett’s room which Esme tutted loudly about – it was in a terrible state with clothes strewn all over the floor. Then came Edward’s room and Jasper had gasped, stepping into one of the rooms for the first time on the tour as he gasped,

“How many books does he own?”

“Do you like books, Jasper?” Esme asked eagerly.

Jasper nodded, his hands stroking the spines.

“Most of them are about music – Edward is music mad you see but if you like I can get some books for you to read while you stay with us,” Esme offered.

“Um, no, it’s fine…you’ve already gone to so much trouble on my account,” Jasper mumbled quickly, backing out of the room as quickly as he had entered.

“Oh, it’s no trouble my dear!” Esme cried. “There’s a lovely little second hand book shop in Seattle that we could visit. I know the owner, you see, and he would be more than pleased to give us a good deal on some books for you.”

“I…I don’t want you spending your money on me…” Jasper mumbled, looking all but mortified at the prospect. Alice put her arms around his waist.

“Jasper, my parents love to spoil us and now that you’re here they’re going to spoil you too. I’m afraid that the only thing you can do is get used to it,” she told him as cheerfully as she could manage.

            “Oh, you…” Esme scolded her but she was smiling.

            Jasper said nothing, a slight frowned appearing on his handsome face.

            Alice could see it was going to take a lot of hard work on their part to get him cross this feeling that everything they did for him was out of pity or charity.

            “And this will be your room,” Esme said, deciding it was best to go on with the tour. Opening the door she gestured for Jasper to enter first. “The sheets on the bed are fresh this morning and the clothes I spoke of are hanging in the wardrobe. Now Carlisle and I want you to feel free to decorate the room however you want to – posters, pictures, whatever you want. We can even look into re-painting the walls if you don’t like it…”

            “No…it’s great,” Jasper breathed softly.

            “I’m glad you think so dear,” Esme said happily. “Mine and Carlisles room is next door so if you have any problems please don’t be afraid to come and see us – all of our children know that our door is always open to them if they need us.”

            “Er…thanks…” Jasper mumbled, definitely feeling awkward.

            “Now, I’ll leave you two to talk by yourselves for a bit,” Esme told them warmly. “I must check on dinner anyway – I hope you like Beef Stew, Jasper.”

            “Er, yeah…I love it,” Jasper mumbled.

            “Excellent. I’ll send one of the others up to fetch you when it’s ready,” Esme promised, kissing Alice on the forehead and smiling across the room at Jasper before she left them alone, heading down towards the kitchen.

            Finally alone Alice could hold it in no longer and sighed loudly,

            “Oh Jasper…why didn’t you tell me?”

 

A/N Sorry this took so long and sorry to leave it there but I haven’t quite decided where to go with this bit yet but I wanted to put something up to make up for leaving this story alone for so long. Comments and suggestions are EXTREMELY welcome.


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